Rev. Robert J.A. Zito to preach at Union Chapel’s final summer service
The Reverend Robert J.A. Zito, J.D., a professor of business law at Marist College, will preach at Union Chapel at 10:30 a.m. on Sunday, September 10. His sermon is titled, “I Will Not Leave You Orphaned.”
This is the closing and Communion Service for the Union Chapel summer season.
Rev. Zito is a former chapel trustee and former chaplain and trustee of the Shelter Island Yacht Club. He has two professions. He is an attorney and former partner at the Wall Street law firm of Carter Ledyard & Milburn LLP and is also the former Parish Deacon of Trinity Church in lower Manhattan. At Marist, he teaches full time.
While at Trinity Church, Rev. Zito led a Bible study group called The Broad Way in which participants studied and discussed the Gospels of the Sunday Lectionary, in addition to liturgical and pastoral duties. He is the canon church attorney for the Episcopal Diocese of New York and as such investigates and prosecutes cases of clergy misconduct before the diocesan Ecclesiastical Trial Court.
Currently, he is on sabbatical from his ministry.
Rev. Zito grew up in Huntington. He graduated from Tulane University in 1978 with a B.A. in English literature and from New York Law School in 1981 with a J.D. He was ordained in 2001 at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine in New York City.
He is listed in the Marquis “Who’s Who in the World,” “Who’s Who in America” and “Who’s Who in American Law,” and is found on the Super Lawyers list as well. He is a Knight of Justice in the Most Venerable Order of the Hospital of St. John of Jerusalem, under the charge of Queen Elizabeth II, and serves as chair of the New York Regional Committee and as a chapter member. He is also a Knight of the Order of Merit of the House of Savoy. For 10 years Rev. Zito served in the New York Guard, Judge Advocate General Corps, and retired with the rank of Lieutenant Colonel.
Rev. Zito is married to Dana Sabin Cole, formerly a trustee and vice president and secretary of the Church Club of New York and an alumna and trustee of the Dana Hall School in Wellesley, Massachusetts. They both lived aboard their sloops, West Highlander and Pied a Mer, in Dering Harbor for 20 summers with their West Highland white terriers.
They now live in the Hudson Valley with their petit basset griffon vendéen dogs, Clancy and Chowder.
Guest musicians for the service will be organist Joan Osborn, and soloist Bill Packard, Flute. Mr. Packard studied flute at the Eastern Suffolk School of Music in Riverhead. He helped found and performs with the chamber music group Basically Baroque and has also performed with the woodwind quintet East End Winds.
Submitted by Union Chapel
