When did questions stop being OK?

We spent a lot of time this morning in our Lectionary Group thinking about the way in which Jesus approaches the Woman at the Well and in turn the way in which the Woman approaches her neighbors. They both come with questions (I think the NRSV is wrong in making Jesus' request for water a command). We then began to ponder when questions stopped being OK in the church. Moses had questions. The Prophets had questions. The Disciples had questions. The Churches to which the Epistles were written had questions. "Orthodoxy" is formed out of questions; the nature of Jesus, the Trinity, the Scriptures, the Virgin Birth, etc... it all comes from questions.

So when exactly did questions stop being OK? Did politics and religion start being taboo subjects on the same day? Did we lose the ability to ask questions and disagree in community by some evolutionary hick-up? Because it seems clear in the story that we are to approach one another with questions. There are no experts in faith; we are all stumbling along. Just as Jesus does not assume himself better than the woman; so too as she rushes back to town, she does not assume that she's got it right; her experience of the Messiah (could it be, no, well, no) is not the only experience; but it is all she knows. She approaches her neighbors with a sense of vulnerability; "this couldn't be the Messiah, could it?" She doesn't have all the answers, and neither do we.

But how much damage is done by those of us who claim to know it all; to have the corner on God's love? So much it pains me. So much that I have done in my ignorance. When did questions stop being OK? Let's take it back. Let's make questions OK again. Let's approach life with questions, not answers. It'll make us vulnerable, but it'll be oh so worth it.