Being gay is a fundamental part of my being - the core of who I've always been, and the thing that I had repressed and run from all my life.

I'm enjoying prison ministry, particularly with the women in Hudson County Jail who have suffered tremendously in their lives.

I try to be grateful for the abundance of the blessings that I have, for the journey that I'm on and to relish each day as a gift.

More than anything else I recall being, or trying very deliberately to be, a perfect child. Not a Goody Two-shoes, but a kid who did good, who worked hard and met every expectation. I strove to achieve in the excessive way that psychotherapists tend to regard with concern.

The arc of American history almost inevitably moves toward freedom. Whether it's Lincoln and the Emancipation Proclamation, the expansion of women's rights or, now, gay rights, I think there is an almost-inevitable march toward greater civil liberties.

I do not believe that God tortures any person simply for its own sake. I believe that God enables all things to work for the greater good.

I have two extraordinary daughters, who, I can say proudly, are doing very well in school and in piano. Daughters are a father's joy.