Sorry if anyone took offense at my somewhat (well, very!) flippant discussion of an incident a decade and a half ago, but what actually occurred was a wonderful free-ranging theological discussion. It's just that my roommate and I expected our guests to have the same open mind to Biblical interpretation that they expected us to have. And as they offered each of their interpretations, we countered with counterinterpretations from the great religious minds of history, from Ezra and Jeremiah to Hillel and Shamai to the Nicene Coucil and Thomas Aquinas to Maimonides and Rashi to Thomas Merton and Harvey Cox to Emil Fackenheim and Abraham Joshua Heschel. Perhaps they came thinking they may have had all the answers. We hoped that by the time they left, they'd realize that we had all the questions. And a religious approach that thinks questions are sometimes better than answers.

It was actually a good-natured, wonderful examination of lots of religious tenets.

--Charlie Baum