Biography

Contact: Rev. Dr. Beverly Dale
Email: revbev@beverlydale.org

Biography of Beverly Dale

The Reverend Beverly Dale grew up as the daughter of a tenant farmer in Moultrie County in Illinois. Upon graduating from high school she married and raised two children deferring her education until later. In 1982 she received a BS in sociology with a specialization in sexuality and minor in psychology followed by an MS in sociology specializing in marriage and the family in 1983 from Illinois State University in Normal Illinois. Her thesis was called “Exposure to Religion and the Sexual Double Standard.” She then pursued her Master of Divinity (1985) and Doctor of Ministry (1988) at Chicago Theological Seminary. Her doctoral work was focused on pastoral counseling and reviving small churches and entitled “Celebrating the Present Congregational Story as a Means to Small Church Renewal”. She was ordained by the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) and has served as the pastor of Colfax Christian Church in Colfax, Illinois from 1983-1989 and is currently serving as a clergy-in-residence at the United Christian Church of Levittown.

She has been the chief administrator of two organizations; Volunteer Services in Iroquois County in Illinois that provided a variety of social services to the elderly from 1974-1980, and from 1989-2010 at the Christian Association at the University of Pennsylvania, a progressive social justice ecumenical ministry. It was also during her time at the University that her writing and performing became more central to her career. In 2006 she wrote, directed and performed in her one woman show “An Irreverent Journey from Eggbeaters to Vibrators” that included poetry, storytelling and original music. This show debuted at the Philadelphia Fringe Festival in 2006 and has since then been performed in San Francisco, Wilmington Delaware while parts of the performance have been performed in Chicago and at a variety of churches and local venues for sexuality-oriented workshops.

She has a YouTube series titled Sex is Good designed to prompt personal reflection and group discussion on a variety of sexual topics. In addition, her publication, Advancing Sexual Health for the Christian Client: Data & Dogma co-authored with sexologist and therapist, Rachel Keller, published by Routledge Publications (2019) is an important resource and provides tools for professionalmsex therapists, sex educators and pastoral counselors to help address intimacy concerns of clients and parishioners who are struggling with sex-negative Christian beliefs.

She lives in Philadelphia with her partner and in her spare time enjoys flower gardening and expanding her culinary skills as well as plotting to shift the culture and the Church away from the toxicity of body objectification and sexual repression to a more pleasure-centered, women-friendly, joy-filled world.