Friends and relatives said they believe that the Rev. Bill Foster was cut out for the ministry and loved all 60 years he spent as an Episcopal priest.
Foster, who served almost three decades at St. Matthew’s Episcopal Church in Grand Junction, died May 3 at 83.
Foster rolled with the strains of parish ministry: being on call constantly to the needs of people, working for days on his sermons and helping people who didn’t even know him.
“You didn’t get a Saturday night special” for his Sunday morning sermons, said his wife, Sharon. “He started working on his sermons on Monday morning.”
A student of history, Foster liked to blend world history into his sermons and “they were kind of academic,” said the Rev. Howard Ebright, who was Foster’s assistant pastor for several years. “I think what he liked most about the ministry was preaching.”
Few people knew that in addition to his better-known activities, Foster used the church discretionary fund to help strangers.
He regularly left money at a local hotel and some restaurants for strangers passing through who had no money, said daughter Alison Geer of Grand Junction.
Foster had a “great sense of humor,” said a friend, Dr. Edward Ellinwood. He also had patience, family members said.
He and Sharon, his second wife, blended their families and set an example of how to do it, said Geer, who called it “a delicate dance.”
When one son, Kelley Fetter, was little he couldn’t say “Father Bill,” as Foster was usually called. “It came out ‘Barfill,’ ” said Geer. The name stuck and other family members started using it. Foster wasn’t bothered, Geer said.
William Foster was born in Montrose on July 12, 1925, and graduated from Montrose High School.
As a child he rode with his father, the Rev. John Foster, as he served various small parishes in the Montrose-Delta area.
Foster earned his undergraduate degree in history and English at Western State College in Gunnison and his divinity degree at Church Divinity School of the Pacific in Berkeley, Calif.
He served churches in the Montrose area before going to Grand Junction in 1963. He was pastor of St. Matthew’s until his retirement in 1992.
Foster’s first wife, Eileen Buzan, died, and he married Sharon Fetter in 1975.
In addition to her, his daughter and son Kelley Fetter of Albuquerque, he is survived by another son, Robert Foster of Moscow, Russia; daughters Lynn Damiani of Prescott, Ariz.; Layne Racht of Brevard, N.C.; Gaylynn Hoffman of Silverdale, Wash.; and Elizabeth Harris of Grand Junction; 15 grandchildren; and 10 great-grandchildren.
Virginia Culver: 303-954-1223 or vculver@denverpost.com
