The Reverend Jean Quarterman McGraw, 1946-2026

The Reverend Jean Quarterman McGraw, a beloved priest of our diocese and widow of the Rev. Stan McGraw, died Monday, November 8. Service arrangements have not yet been announced.

Rev. Jean, a native of North Charleston, met her husband while he was serving as summer youth director at St. Thomas, North Charleston during his time in seminary. She was a member there and played the organ at a church nearby. They were married in 1967 and Stan was ordained to the priesthood in our diocese in 1970. They lived briefly in Beaufort, SC before moving to Atlanta, where they lived for almost 30 years. She supported his ministry, helped raise their three children, and also had her own career, working as a computer programmer at Emory University, and later becoming the head of a law firm’s IT department when they moved to North Carolina.

When she felt the call to ordained minstry in a later season of her life, Jean earned a Master of Divinity degree from the Seminary of the Southwest in 2011. She was ordained to the priesthood that year in the Diocese of Lexington (Kentucky), where she began her ministry serving as deacon at Calvary Episcopal Church in Ashland, KY. After returning to South Carolina, Rev. Jean was working at Old St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church in Charleston when the diocese experienced a schism in 2012. Led by the efforts of a group of lay leaders determined to maintain a presence of The Episcopal Church in the West Ashley area of Charleston, she served as the first priest-in-charge of St. Francis Episcopal Church, which first began meeting in a local funeral home and remained active in West Ashley for almost a decade.

“Jean provided essential leadership at a critcally important time in the life of our diocese both as the president of the Standing Committee and as the priest-in-charge at St. Francis,” said Bishop Ruth Woodliff-Stanley. “She was a gift and a blessing to this diocese.”

She is fondly remembed for her work with youth ministries and the junior Daughters of the King. They lovingly called her “Momma Jean.” She was elected to serve our diocese on the Standing Committee in 2014 and served as president for the final year of her three-year term. She also served the wider church, as alternate deputy to General Convention of The Episcopal Church in 2015, and as a deputy to the 79th General Convention in 2018. 

The McGraws are survived by their three children: Scott (Wendy), Chris (Leslie Jo), and Dana (Danielle), and five grandchildren. More information will be shared as it becomes available.

Rest eternal grant to her, O Lord; let light perpetual shine upon her.