Rev. William Payton

News Obituary Article

LAWRENCEVILLE: Rev. William Payton, 67, St. Edward's 'Father Bill'

By HOLLY CRENSHAW

Beneath his priest's collar, the Rev. Bill Payton harbored a comedian's heart.

At St. Edward's Episcopal Church in Lawrenceville, he didn't mind making himself the butt of a joke because "people dearly love to see the clay feet of holy folks and all that," he said in a 1994 Atlanta Journal-Constitution article.

For a parishioner's birthday party, the Rev. Payton and his wife showed up as characters played by Ruth Buzzi and Arte Johnson on the old "Laugh-In" TV show. She dressed as a bag lady, he as a trench coat-wearing dirty old man.

The crowd roared.

"I think the sound of laughter is unique to all God's creation and perfectly delightful to experience," the Rev. Payton said in the same article. "It is interesting to note in Dante's 'Inferno' and 'Paradiso,' it is in the inferno --- in hell --- that nobody laughs."

Of course, once the laughs died down, the deeper meaning of his sermons were revealed. And in that moment, he hoped to draw his parishioners closer to God and closer to each other.

The Rev. William R. Payton, 67, died of leukemia Wednesday at his Atlanta residence. The funeral is noon today at the Episcopal Cathedral of St. Philip. Cremation Society of the South is in charge of arrangements.

The Rev. Payton grew up as a Baptist in Carrollton but became an Episcopalian at 16.

He was drawn to the Episcopal Church's liturgy, its music and its silence --- an unusual yearning in a teenage boy.

"But Bill was a very different person, a very spiritual person," said his wife of 34 years, Joan Tyler Payton, of Atlanta.

Some of that was obvious the moment you walked in their door, his wife said.

The Rev. Payton loved to cook, spent hours hunched over intricate works of calligraphy, kept everything from jazz to Gregorian chants playing on the CD player, and collected more than 200 "holy terrors," mystery books where the sleuth is a priest or other religious figure.

He earned his undergraduate degree in religion and philosophy from the University of Georgia in 1965.

He was awarded a master's of divinity from the General Theological Seminary in New York City.

Ordained as an Episcopal priest 44 years ago, the Rev. Payton served in Augusta and churches throughout the Northeast, supported leadership roles for women and guided the Episcopal Church of the Holy Spirit in Cumming through 1987 racial tension in Forsyth County.

"One of Bill's greatest gifts was to go into a hurting parish and walk the people there through the healing process," his wife said.

At St. Edward's, where he served from 1987 to 1995, he hired a raucous Elvis Presley impersonator to celebrate a newly paved parking lot, then smoothed things over when irate neighbors called the police to complain.

He wore shocking multicolored plaid golf pants to church functions and invited every parishioner to his home for dinner.

He reminded members to act on their moral obligations to others.

"Father Bill was a bit flamboyant and everybody just loved him for it," said minister of music Richard Moore of Lawrenceville. "He is the person who brought St. Edward's together as a family."

After his 2003 retirement, he became a priest associate at the Cathedral of St. Philip, where he shared the spiritual journey of his declining health with others.

True to his nature, his funeral will start with an upbeat gospel choir before it assumes a more solemn tone.

With his deep belly laugh and devout prayerfulness, "he was just a wonderful blend," said the Rev. Beth Knowlton, canon for prayer and mission at St. Philip's. "He brought together a very Anglo-Catholic presence with a real joy in living."

Survivors other than his wife include two sons, Ramsay Tyler Payton of Willits, Calif., and John Wynton Payton of Lawrenceville, N.J.; his mother, Lula Ramsay Payton of Tryon, N.C.; and a brother, Robert Wynton Payton of Hendersonville, N.C.

© 2008 The Atlanta Journal-Constitution