The Bishop's Daughter: A Memoir

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Editorial Reviews:

Product Description
"An unsparing portrait of a glamorous but elusive father and his daughter's search for the truth about his secret life."—Sylvia Nasar

Paul Moore's vocation as an Episcopal priest took him—with his wife Jenny and a family that grew to nine children—from robber-baron wealth to work among the urban poor of postwar America, prominence as an activist bishop in Washington during the Johnson years, leadership in the civil rights and peace movements, and two decades as the bishop of New York. The Bishop's Daughter is a daughter's story of that complex, visionary man: a chronicle of her turbulent relationship with a father who struggled privately with his sexuality while she openly explored hers, and a searching account of the consequences of sexual secrets. With a depth of questioning that recalls James Carroll's An American Requiem, this memoir engages the reader in the great issues of American life: war, race, family, sexuality, and faith. 22 photographs.

Customer Reviews: Read 8 more reviews...

5 out of 5 stars

Fallen Family May 11, 2008
22 out of 26 found this review helpful

A memoir that is religious and sexual at its core -- this is the story that Honor Moore tells of her father, herself and their places in their extended families. A WWII veteran who was convinced that his near-death experiences pointed him into religious life of the Episcopal Church, he rose to Bishop of Diocese of New York. But he was tormented by his double life as a bisexual -- and in a generation, his won daughter would struggle with her own sexuality, starting with an abortion and a non-coversation with the possible father. The book is a brief bio of her father, then of herself, and then of truths coming home to the light of day. A wonderful and honest book for the reader to consume.

1 out of 5 stars

Goneril's New Royalties May 28, 2008
11 out of 39 found this review helpful

MY DEAD GAY BISHOP DAD - should sell;
And what are parents for?
I could not love thee, dear, so well
Loved I not Honor Moore.

5 out of 5 stars

A fascinating autobiography written with compassion and understanding May 25, 2008
6 out of 6 found this review helpful

The author, Honor Moore, was born to very wealthy parents. It is no exaggeration to say that she was born with the proverbial "gold spoon in her mouth". Her father, the Rt. Rev. Bishop Paul Moore, the famous Episcopal Bishop who lived in New York, was a descendant of an aristocratic family, and her mother, Jenny McKean was an heir to a fabulous and old fortune. To quote the author:

"My father was born in 1919, the beneficiary of vast wealth. He was a grandson of William H. Moore, Palm Beach, where they lived in an Addison Mizner villa, Lake Worth on one side of the house and a wide ocean beach on the other." In addition, he owned a house in the Adirondacks by the lake, an enormous apartment in Manhattan on the eighteenth floor of a building on Fifth Avenue, with a view of Central Park, and a house in Connecticut by the Long Island Sound also.

Even though the book is titled "The Bishop's Daughter", it has a great deal of information, both pleasant and unpleasant, about the famous Episcopalian Bishop. The Bishop was wealthy, but he wasn't a happy man. His first wife considered him "the most unhappy man she had ever known." He was married twice, and he had nine children. And he had a lover named Andrew Verver also. Their secret romance lasted over 28 years. With a great deal of courage, compassion, affection, and understanding, the author describes the relationship and romance the Bishop had with Andrew. I was quite moved when I read the passages that desribed in detail their romance. After reading those passages I thought Andrew is a friendly, decent and lovable man.

The author was estranged from her father. But she reconciled after the Bishop became ill and he was diagnosed with terminal cancer, melanoma of the brain. After the Bishop's death, she met Andrew in New York to try to understand and also to get more information about their love affair, and then they drove to Connecticut to visit the Bishop's grave.

This is a sad and very moving autobiography, written in simple, clear and elegant prose: "He had been a fixture there for years, a giant of a man with white hair, tilting from side to side (he had a hip problem), often walking Percy, his tiny Yorkshire terrier. There was a cafe on the corner, and, directly across the street, a one-story building with tall windows and what looked from the outside like a vaulted ceiling. It housed a hairdresser who seemed always to have the most beautiful and exotic flowers in his salon." Reading this book will touch your heart.

5 out of 5 stars

Desperately needed exposure to help our learning... July 2, 2008
5 out of 7 found this review helpful

Honor Moore did a stupendous, much needed service for her father, Bishop Paul Moore, Jr., herself, her siblings, and all of those in our society who remain illiterate and prejudiced about any and all sexual orientations. Given the ugly consequences of ignorance and understanding regarding homosexuality, it is no wonder that Bishop Moore, like so many others, had to hide such a significant part of himself, his sexuality, or a vital part of it, in order to perform the life service that was another grand and vibrant part of himself, his church service for the good of the millions whose minds and lives he influenced for good. We must remember that homosexuals are usually given life by heterosexuals who in so many sad cases are then ready to throw those children away. We must remember that the caste system created by heterosexuals that forces bisexuals and homosexuals to live in suffocating, locked closets is the evil that promotes what appears to be the deceit or duplicity that bisexuals and homosexuals must then practice in order to also live seemingly freely, seemingly fully. Ignorance, fear, and phobia are the components of prejudice, all prejudice. We have a desperate need to enlighten the ignorance with understanding, replace the fear with acceptance and love. Only then will we see the dissolution of phobia finally evolve. And heterosexuals must pay attention to bisexuals and homosexuals to gain a wider understanding of sexuality. The opposite side of that coin is that bisexuals and homosexuals must be ready and willing to help heterosexuals learn. That will require bi-directional openness. Any of Honor Moore's siblings and any others who think she betrayed her father need to carefully study her memoirs to see how she truly provided Bishop Paul Moore, Jr., the "wings of a dove" he so painfully sought all his life. Now her memories and our knowledge of that great man, that man of clay, can allow him to function more freely and fully as shepherd of an even larger flock. Now Paul Moore, Jr., can truly "fly away and rest,"

Gilbert Cantlin

5 out of 5 stars

A susbstantive memoir July 6, 2008
5 out of 5 found this review helpful

Of the summer's two "gay Episcopal" memoirs -- the other being Gene Robinson's book -- I found Honor Moore's by far the more substantive. Nearly all of us wrestle with our parents, and the more charismatic and larger than life they are, the more likely it is that this wrestling will leave us wounded. Honor Moore courageously shows us her wounds (and her wonder) as well as her father's complexity and her mother's humanity.

Moore opens a window onto the significant social pressures Episcopal clergy once faced to sunder their sexuality from their spirituality -- conservative evangelicals take note -- and this alone makes her book a valuable contribution to church social history.

The real beauty of the book, however, lies in its depiction of two parents and their eldest daughter trying to live their lives as authentically as they can. This is difficult in any era, no matter what the current social prejudices, and if none of the three quite succeeds as much as we would have wished, their journeys are no less moving.

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