Presences A Bishop's Life in the City

On the face of it, Paul Moore was unlikely to become a Christian bishop and human rights leader. The scion of a wealthy industrialist, Moore was raised in luxury and was expected to attend St. Paul's School and Yale. At St. Paul's, though, Moore made his first confession to an Anglican priest, and the presence of God he felt then gave an unexpected direction to a life that has inspired social activists and progressive Christians worldwide.

After heroic service in World War II, Moore entered the ministry, and his subsequent life shows the ways deep faith and strong social commitment can influence each other. In a ghetto parish in Jersey City, Moore pioneered a new form of urban ministry; as Auxiliary Bishop of Washington, D.C., he had the ear of the Kennedy and Johnson Administrations. And as Bishop of New York, Moore led protests against the Vietnam War and opened the Episcopal clergy to women and gay people -- acts that are still controversial today -- while campaigning for human rights in Africa, the Soviet Union, East Timor, and American inner cities. Moore writes movingly of the presence of God in his life and stresses the importance of the Church's witness against poverty and injustice. A bishop and a father of nine, a war hero and a peace activist, Moore is a singular American character; his colorful, personable, affecting memoirs tell of a notable twentieth-century life.