Dear Bishop Sisk,

I first encountered Lou Tarsitano through his writing. I don’t remember where, for he wrote for a number of publications I read—perhaps it was in the Evangelical Catholic in the days when David Mills was its editor. He struck me as one of the most consistently trenchant, penetrating, and knowledgeable authors I had read among living Anglicans. He always went straight to the heart of his subject, anatomized it elegantly, and served it up neatly for the consideration or ridicule it deserved.

Buddhists offered chants about peace and an end to suffering. Imam Omar Shaheed of Masjid as-Salaam, a Muslim mosque off Monticello Road, recited a verse from the Quran that included the words, “O people! We created you from a male and a female, made you into nations and tribes, that you may recognize one another.”

Ray’s decision affects the pending wedding of his own daughter, Catherine, who had planned to be married at St. Thomas’s. She and her future husband have decided to support him by having a civil ceremony instead.

Ray has not responded to several Register requests for comment. But in an interview he granted with The New York Times, he acknowledged he is gay and that he and his wife separated in 1986. They are now divorced.