Celebrating Bishop Elaine Stanovsky

Led by Her Example

After a remarkable career, Bishop Elaine Stanovsky is retiring at the start of 2023. She has followed her call to ministry as a student, an ordained deacon and elder, a district superintendent, and finally as Bishop of Mountain Sky and then later the Greater Northwest. She’s served on six general boards of the United Methodist Church, and participated in diverse ecumenical organizations and efforts.

Throughout her career, Bishop Stanovsky has made space at the table for new voices. She’s shown us that women belong in the pulpit, the cabinet, and the boardroom. She’s used her power and privilege to fight injustice by offering safe sanctuary for queer pastors, speaking out against racism, and prioritizing new church starts that reach underserved communities.

A Cause Close to Her Heart

One of Bishop Stanovky’s special areas of focus has been making reparations to indigenous people who have been displaced and harmed by the United Methodist Church.

She helped set the record straight about the massacre of Arapaho and Cheyenne people at Sand Creek, and brought thirteen busloads of United Methodists to the site in 2014 for an act of repentance. With her blessing, parcels of land in Wallowa County previously occupied by the United Methodist Church were given back to the Nez Perce people in 2018 and 2021.

Bishop Stanovsky also helped to start the Circle of Indigenous Ministries, which is part of an ongoing effort to heal historic trauma and dismantle racism. She has asked that any retirement gifts benefit this ministry.

Learn more, contribute and share well wishes at faith.foundation/circle.

Bishop Stanovsky visits the site of the Sand Creek Massacre in 2009 as part of an ongoing effort to tell the truth and make reparations.

Bishop Stanovsky sprinkles baptismal water on delegates at the 2017 Pacific Northwest Annual Conference.