It is not often that an intra-university dispute on whether to ask for toleration rather than respect gets international press coverage. But such has been the fate of recent events at Englandâs venerable University of Cambridge. The story is especially instructive since in our religiously plural world we are inundated with exhortations to respect a range of religious beliefs. The brouhaha began when a committee headed by Professor Stephen Toope, the university vice-chancellor (American translation: âpresidentâ), offered a set of guidelines ostensibly to protect and promote free speech at the university. But, as in so many other hallowed halls of academia, freedom of speech, and thought, appeared to take second place to restrictions on speech.