Watching the movie adaptation of a book is always an exercise in openness and patience, but it’s also a way to dive deeper into the subject material. When I read the book, I was completely focused on Reuven, and I only cared about the other characters as they related to him. However, watching the film was like getting a second chance to read the story for the first time, and I had a completely different experience. In the movie, Danny and Reuven’s friendship was like its own character, and instead of rooting for Reuven, I was rooting for the friends. I was so moved by the immediacy of their friendship: once each one had decided that hatred of the other was uncomfortable or undesirable, they became friends. Danny says in the movie and the book, “It’s like this, whenever I do something I don’t understand, I try to think it through, until I understand it.” At the end of the movie, during the discussion, I loved what my friend Mary had to say: that if more people sought to understand other viewpoints, truly understand, there would be much more peace in the world.

In my city, there are easily 50 parishes. My family attends Mass at the church closest to us, which is where I grew up and went to school. At the movie night, I invited friends not only from various Well-Read Mom groups, but from different parishes around the city. Now, let’s just say, my parish reminds me of the Malters’ while a certain other parish reminds me of the Saunders. Allow me to explain my shortcoming—and the beauty of the proposal set before me that night we watched the movie. My shortcoming is something Mary calls “reverse judgment,” defined thus: the assumption that a group or person looks down upon another group or person. The assumption leads one to distrust, dislike, or resentment. My attitude positively drips with pride and insecurity, but the Lord has shown me mercy (thankfully not in the form of a shard of glass slitting my eyeball). Danny and Reuven immediately found that the thing they have most in common is the Talmud, which Reb Saunders says is the rope that God throws to us as we drown in ignorance.

Reading the book, I was distraught at the Jews’ lack of unity, thinking the one chance they had to come together, they had missed. Watching the movie, I was distraught at my own duplicity, for down the road at a different parish are my brothers and sisters in Christ, to whom I am united in the Eucharist, but against whom I hold a petty grudge. I thank God for his grace, and for this opportunity to admit in front of you all, my humiliating sin. I beg forgiveness!