The Week magazine convened with eclectic celebrity panel for a Valentine’s Day lunch at Michael Jordan’s Steak House in Grand Central Terminal. The magazine’s regular seminars traditionally debate political issues, but to mark this amorous occasion, moderator Harold Evans gathered erratic actress Farrah (Charlie’s Angels) Fawcett, gay writer Edmund (A Boy’s Own Story) White, and feminist author Erica (Fear of Flying) Jong to ponder the mysteries of love.

Farrah (who at 57 is just as tan, fit, and blonde as the titillating poster girl of the 70s) arrived fashionably late amidst a swarm of fawning photogs. After starring on Broadway in Bobbi Boland until it folded just weeks into previews last November, she is now deciding which of the pending TV and film offers she will accept. Her perceptions on the opposite sex: “Men can go out and have senseless fun. They do it all the time.” Farrah also credited Redmond, her teenage son (with actor Ryan O’Neal), for giving her a profound education on the male psyche. She once overheard him, as a young boy, bragging to his friends, “Mine’s bigger than yours.“ .... Right!

Other salacious tidbits we heard: Erica Jong, married four times, confessed that she has had sexual encounters with women, which have only convinced her of her true heterosexuality.

The voice on gay love, Edmund White, admitted he was twice engaged to women, following “the advice of my shrink to seek fulfillment in a meaningful relationship.” Since crossing over to a gay lifestyle, his perspective on what a meaningful relationship is has changed: “I have been with the same man for nine years and we have a don’t-ask-don’t-tell relationship. We have enough deep affection for one another to allow ourselves to have our own sexual adventures.” White’s view: Gay relationships have been more open because they’ve been free of traditional constructs, like marriage and children. But this is changing. “Maybe now that gay men and women are getting married,” he said, “we’ll get to have all that possessiveness and jealousy, too.” White’s conclusion: “Love is a disease. Love is co-dependent.”

Romance novelist Jackie Collins phoned in her love notes, insisting that most men have a mistress and most women, a lover. “All women should take a lover on the side,” Jackie proclaimed, although she emphatically denied that she practices what she preaches.

Jong added that wealthy men are the biggest culprits of infidelity. “If you’re Warren Buffet, you can have several women,” she said.” If you’re a poor schnook commuting on the train, you can’t.”

At this point, Harold Evans shared his more traditional perspective, confessing the deep fulfillment he has found in his devoted and monogamous marriage of 21 years to magazine-editor-turned-Talk-show-host (of CNBC’s Topic A) Tina Brown.

Famed director (Last Tango in Paris) Bernardo Bertolucci was patched in via phone from Rome, just in time to churn the stomachs of the lunchers by sharing the worshipful love he has had for his idol, French director Jean-Luc Godard: “I had so much passion for him,” he rhapsodized, “that the first time we met, I vomited on him.” (Please spare us the small talk at the next luncheon we share, Bernie!)

As the late sex-pert Mae West put it: “To err is human, but it feels divine.” And we conclude with Jong’s clarifying quote from the podium: “God is love, but get it in writing!”