Lura Jean Cayton ( Hattan)

Lura Jean (Hattan) Cayton, 79, of Blue Springs, MO, died peacefully surrounded by members of her family who sang her into God’s embrace on Thursday, February 27, 2025. She was born in Pensacola, FL on May 9, 1945. Lura grew up in Fremont, NE graduating from Fremont Senior High School and joined her parents and siblings as avid fans of University of Nebraska football. Go Huskers! She attended college and graduated from Phillips University in Enid, OK. During her time in college she met Richard Cayton while volunteering at a nursing home. Their courtship was facilitated by cupid posing incognito as a resident of the home who would get the two of them arguing and then just laugh. The flames of their love sufficiently fanned, Richard and Lura were married on July 3, 1966 (“the hottest day of the year”) in Fremont.

After graduating from Phillips University, Lura began seminary at Phillips Graduate Seminary. She put her education on pause to be a full time mother to her first two children, though she never ceased to be an active leader in the churches of which she was a part. She was always committed to racial equity and served in many ways toward that dream, from intentionally making sure that her family had contact with diverse people and stories, to volunteering with and developing the Mother to Mother program, to being an active member of Church Women United, to visiting southeast Asia as the Vietnam war was coming to a close. These things shaped the ways she served in ministry then as well as after she was ordained. As her children grew, the call to ordained ministry reintensified and she began her education in earnest at Phillips Graduate Seminary. Despite the surprise of a third child, she pressed on to finish her education and was ordained to Christian Ministry in 1986. With wisdom, patience, and profound leadership she served as a pastor of churches in Newton and Wichita, KS, as well as Oklahoma City, OK. For a time she served as the Crop Walk coordinator for Church World Service in

Oklahoma and drove approximately 84,000 miles in 1 year reaching communities across the state. While Lura had many gifts for pastoral ministry in congregations and had a huge impact on those she served, it was while serving Capitol Hill Christian Church in Oklahoma City that her passion and calling began to shape her ministry in a new way. In 1993 there was flooding in south Oklahoma City that affected members of her congregation. She began organizing a group of pastors and churches to respond to the needs of the people of the communities impacted. Two other events solidified the calling and passion for disaster relief and recovery work: the bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building and the first of three significant tornadoes that struck Moore, OK. In an effort to connect survivors of devastation of all kinds, she led a group exchange between survivors of the Oklahoma City bombing and survivors of the Lake Nyos disaster in Cameroon, Africa. While serving part time on the interfaith disaster committee in OKC, she continued her ministerial work at Capital Hill, including the formation of a hispanic church in response to the growing community. In 2002 she began full time work as a Disaster Relief and Recovery Liaison for Church World Service. In that work she excelled at organizing people, teaching and helping them negotiate the challenging procedures and red tape of the recovery process to help them establish a new normal. Notably she spent a significant portion of 2 years helping people recover from Hurricane Katrina.

Lura retired from Church World Service in 2011 and spent a glorious 3 hours or so of retirement before she signed on as a contractor with FEMA to continue disaster recovery work. In 2015 she retired for a second time to be treated for and recover from breast cancer. However, she never stopped watching the weather channel, keeping track of alerts for areas in which the ones she loved lived. In 2016 she was awarded a lifetime achievement award from FEMA for her work in disaster relief and recovery. Lura loved people. She loved learning about people, welcoming people into her home and into the communities in which she moved, and traveling to meet other people and connect with them. Throughout her life, she found a way to make a positive impact on a wide variety of people in a wide variety of circumstances whether in a brief encounter or a relationship over many years. She was an enthusiastic quilter, enjoying the way patterns could be brought together to make beautiful art. She was gifted at caring for her household. She enjoyed sewing, often making clothes for her family, particularly their suits and dresses for Easter Sundays. She loved cooking and baking. She delighted in arts and crafts, brain teasers, problem solving, and watching movies. She took special pleasure in doing any and all of those things with her children, grandchildren, and great grandchildren (and really any other children who were interested).

She was preceded in death by her parents Wilbur D. and Doris J. (Statz) Hattan, brother David Hattan, granddaughter Courtney Rocheleau, grandson Blair Ceradsky, and Brother-in-Law David Romberg. Those who continue to love and miss her include her husband Richard Cayton of Blue Springs, Daughters Sonya (Marc) Dickey of Odessa, and Natalee Cayton (Georgiann) of Brooklyn, NY, son Owen (Lori) Cayton of Ankeny, IA, grandchildren Felix (Raven) Ceradsky, Miranda Rocheleau (Austin), Joey Rocheleau (Adrienne), Toviel Cayton (Ashley), Mattai Cayton (Jocelyn), Elian Cayton, and Naomi (Kevin) Champ, great grandchildren Sophia, Wyatt, and Ruby, two sisters Valerie Romberg of Indianapolis, IN, and Lynelle Yzaguirre of DeSoto, TX, Sister-in-law Melinda Hattan of Austin, TX, brother-in-law Manuel Yzaguirre of Richardson, TX, Nieces and Nephews Koren (Jamie), Jarrod (Rachel), and Heather (Jeremy), and a multitude of extended family and friends.

A memorial service will be held on Thursday, March 6, 2025 at 10:30 a.m. at Community Christian Church, 4601 Main St, Kansas City, MO 64112. The service will also be live streamed on the Community Christian Church YouTube channel, @community4kc (https://www.youtube.com/@Community4KC). Gifts in memory and celebration of Lura’s life can be sent to Community Christian Church. Half of the contributed amount will go to support the work of Church World Service and the other half will go to support the justice ministries of Community Christian Church.