The Episcopal Church in Maryland celebrated the life of its 11th bishop with all the formality and ceremony of a cathedral funeral Saturday, while remembering a man known as a fierce champion for society’s outsiders.
“Bishop David Leighton knew the burden of being a shepherd,” said the Right Rev. Eugene Taylor Sutton, the current bishop. “He experienced many times the hatred, bitterness and rejection that comes with the office whenever he stood up for those whom society wanted to neglect, or keep outside of the power structures in the church.”