John George Layter was born in New Orleans on August 13, 1939, the only son of John George Layter and Ann Adeline Comelton.   The family later moved to Chicago and then to Denver, where John graduated from Regis High School in 1957 as the valedictorian of his class.

John received a B.S. degree in physics from MIT.  After graduating he moved to Rome  where he studied theology. While in Rome he was able to meet and talk many times with St. Josemaría Escrivá, the founder of the Catholic organization, Opus Dei.

On returning to the U.S. he studied particle physics at Columbia University, where he received a Ph.D. in 1972.  For most of his career, John worked as a research professor for the University of California, Riverside. He traveled back and forth many times over the years between California and Geneva, Switzerland, where he was helping to build the Hadron Collider at CERN.   For a quick picture of size and complexity of this project, see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d_OeQxoKocU.  Among other things, John helped to build the particle detector that was later used to discover the Higgs boson particle (see https://home.cern/science/physics/higgs-boson). 

As a complement to his scientific research in particle physics, he studied and taught philosophy courses on subjects relating to science, such as cosmology, natural philosophy, modern philosophy and Christian anthropology.  Being an excellent Latinist, he also taught courses in Latin. 

After he retired from his work at the University of California and CERN in 2002, John moved to Chicago and devoted more time to his work in philosophy and to helping organize activities of Opus Dei.  

During the last years of his life, John suffered a neurological degeneration similar to Parkinson’s that made it increasingly difficult for him to understand, to talk, to walk, and to move.  But if you were to talk to him about a muon (a subatomic particle), he would still remember muons. Throughout his illness he maintained an extraordinary level of cheerfulness, patience and acceptance, and he was never known to complain.

Visitation 4:30 – 6 p.m. & 7:30 – 9 p.m. Tuesday March 3rd at the Darien Study Center, 7800 Cass Ave., Darien, IL 60561.  Holy Mass will be celebrated at 5:30 p.m. and a rosary will be prayed at 8:30 p.m.  Funeral Mass 10 a.m. Wednesday March 4th at Our Lady of Peace Church, 709 Plainfield Road, Darien.  Interment Queen of Heaven Cemetery.  In lieu of flowers, memorials to the Darien Study Center appreciated.