Cancer Claims Carol Garlow, Wife of Nationally Known Skyline Church Pastor

Updated at 1:43 p.m. April 23, 2013

Carol Garlow, wife of nationally known pastor Jim Garlow who led the California fight against gay marriage, has died after a six-year battle with cancer, Skyline Church has announced.

Memorial services are set for May 3, following a 36-hour prayer vigil at the Rancho San Diego megachurch that looms over Campo Road.

She was 62, said a report on Christian Examiner.

On her Facebook page, East County Supervistor Dianne Jaocob wrote Tuesday: “My deepest condolences to Pastor Jim Garlow and the entire Skyline Church family on the passing of Carol Garlow. She will be missed. I plan to adjourn the May 7 Board of Supervisors meeting in her memory.”

Garlow died Sunday afternoon at her home in El Cajon, Charisma News reported Monday, and quoted Jim Garlow as saying April 16: 

“We have tried to be very transparent for the past five years, nine months and 26 days, and we will be transparent once again. Carol and I have just returned from her oncologist’s office. By mutual consent between Carol and her doctor, treatment has been discontinued. Hospice is now beginning.”

The senior pastor continued:

Although no doctor can ever predict (and he was quick to point that out), it is believed that Carol has approximately one to two months of life left on this earth. I am typing these words through tears and, candidly, in a bit of disbelief and shock. But, as quoted in the Easter sermon two weeks ago, ‘We are not as those who grieve with no hope, nor are we as those who hope with no grief.’ (John Nielson) We have unshakably strong hope. We have indescribably deep grief.

Carol Garlow spoke of her illness as recently as three weeks ago, when she told Christian Examiner that last year a doctor had given her six weeks to live.

 “I had no idea what this doctor was telling my family,” she was quoted as saying. “He felt like my body was shutting down, or beginning to. I came into the emergency room with some problems, but I didn’t feel like I was close to death.”

She said that had she been awake during the doctor’s forecast,  “I could have fought them on it. ‘No I’m not. I am not dying. I have longer to live than [6 weeks]. I can feel it.’ You know, you can just feel it. … The Lord hadn’t spoken to me and said, ‘Carol, you are on your last. I know that He will speak to me and He will say to me, ‘It’s time.’ I haven’t received that yet.”

The Garlows were married 42 years—and Jim sang “You are so beautiful” to Carol on their anniversary in January in front of the congregation, embracing her on stage afterward.

Her diagnosis came in 2007, several weeks before Skyline hosted a group of pastors who eventually launched “a historic battle for traditional marriage via Proposition 8,” said Charisma News, the Christian site connected to the magazine Charisma.

The church said her remains will lie in state next to the Carol Garlow Healing Wall in the church atrium from 10 p.m. May 2 until 10 a.m. May 4, when her remains will be taken for private burial.

In 2009, then state Assemblyman Joel Anderson of La Mesa awarded Carol Jane Luckert Garlow the 77th Assembly District Woman of the Year Award.

“Carol has been an inspiration for our East County community, sharing her incredible insights on parenting, marriage, prayer, healing and overcoming cancer,” Anderson said. 

Part of her ministry involved setting up a team to “pray constantly for political leaders, including all the members of the California State Senate and Assembly,” said an announcement of the award. “This team prays for members by name and sends each of them a birthday card annually.”

Carol Garlow was co-author with her husband of God Still Heals: Answers to Your Questions about Divine Healing.

In June 2007, Carol was diagnosed with primary peritoneal carcinoma, said a GOP announcement. 

“Finally in December 2007, Carol was told she was in remission, and by May of 2008 she resumed a somewhat normal lifestyle,” the site said. 

Condolences were being posted on several Facebook pages, including one for Jim Garlow, and another devoted to prayers for Carol.

Besides being a leading voice for Proposition 8, now being decided by the U.S. Supreme Court, Jim Garlow was active in Pulpit Freedom Sunday, the effort to challenge IRS rules barring clergy from endorsing politicians from the pulpit. 

Besides her husband, Carol Garlow is survived by four children, Janie McGarity, Joshua Garlow, Jacob Garlow and Josie Garlow, and five grandchildren, said Christian Examiner.