The Christian use of religion as a personal love affair both shocked me, and attracted me.

I thought of such Christian inventions as the ghetto and the Jewish badge of shame. The Nazis didn't have to go very far to pick up their know-how.

For a Christian, Jesus is the unique and only way that God has fully revealed himself. For a Jew this cannot be.

My mother was a modern woman with a limited interest in religion. When the sun set and the fast of the Day of Atonement ended, she shot from the synagogue like a rocket to dance the Charleston.

I am pleased now that I have lived in a gay as well as a religious ghetto, though it hasn't been very comfortable. Taken together, their limitations cancel each other out and I have seen the world more kindly and more honestly.

Praying privately in churches, I began to discover that heaven was my true home and also that it was here and now, woven into this life.

When you do a good turn you feel rich, even if you are broke.