Who is Bishop Leonard Fairley?

Bishop Leonard Fairley has been assigned as South Carolina’s new episcopal leader, effective Sept. 1.

Fairley has been bishop of the Kentucky Annual Conference—formally known as the Louisville Episcopal Area—since September 2016. He was nominated by the North Carolina Conference and was elected that July on the seventh ballot during the Southeastern Jurisdictional Conference. 

Fairley was also the interim bishop for the Raleigh Episcopal Area from Sept. 1, 2021, to Jan. 1, 2023. During that time, he continued to serve the Kentucky and Red Bird (now Central Appalachian) Missionary conferences.

Fairley graduated from Pfeiffer College and Duke University’s School of Divinity. He has been awarded honorary doctoral degrees from Union College in Columbia, Kentucky, and Kentucky Wesleyan College

Before his election as bishop, Fairley had served the North Carolina Annual Conference since 1984. His last appointment was as superintendent of the Capital District, the largest district.

Fairley served at St. Peters in Hamlet and Soapstone in Raleigh before becoming the Rockingham District superintendent. He served in that role for seven years before returning to the local church in 2012 as lead pastor at St. Francis in Cary. 

Fairley served on numerous boards and agencies in the North Carolina Conference, among them as Conference Vitalization Consultant, chair of Congregational Development, vice chair of both the Conference Finance and Administration and Conference Board of Church and Society, the North Carolina Conference Transition Team, the Conference Board of Ordained Ministry, the North Carolina Conference Episcopacy Committee, and as a General and Jurisdictional Conference delegate.

He has participated on mission work teams in Costa Rica, Jamaica, Montserrat, Zimbabwe, Haiti, Honduras, Serbia and with the Appalachia Service Project.

Fairley has published a book of poetry, “Who Shall Hear My Voice.” He also was a contributing writer to “The Day the Earth Moved Haiti: From Havoc to Healing.”

Fairley was married to Priscilla Ann Russell until her death in 2013.

In January 2018, God answered a prayer for new love, and in September of that year, he married Dawn Sparks. Dawn had lost her soulmate, the Rev. David Sparks, in 2015. Between them, Bishop Fairley and Dawn have four adult children and 10 grandchildren.