Father Dale Petley was born in Canada and raised in the Canadian provinces of New Brunswick and Ontario. He completed his university and post-graduate studies in Halifax, Nova Scotia. He was ordained in the Episcopal/Anglican Church in 1982 and served in New Brunswick as an assistant priest in his first parish and then as Rector of two other parishes before being invited to become a Priest Associate at All Souls’ in 1997. While in Canada, Father Petley served the larger church in various capacities on Diocesan Council and as Regional Dean and was widely traveled as a visiting evangelist and teacher. He served his community as a member of the board of directors of a nursing home, as Chaplain to the Royal Canadian Legion, and as a coach for a gold medal winning juvenile girl’s softball team. His spare time was spent as a teacher at youth conferences and as the General Editor of a religious publishing company.

As a seminarian, Father Petley studied all aspects of pastoral counseling, worked in psychiatric hospitals, and was employed by the Canadian government in helping to establish The Christian Council for Reconciliation, an organization which ministers to prison inmates and their families, organizes volunteer groups, and works with ex-offenders with a view to curbing recidivism. Father Petley is the editor of Tradition Received and Handed On (1993), Redeeming the Time: the Challenge of Secularity (1994), and The Idea of the Church in Historical Development (1995). He is the author of several published theological essays including, The End of History – Biblical Images of the Apocalypse (2000). Father Petley lives in Nichols Hills and is Chaplain of the Nichols Hills Police Department. Father Petley also served for three years as chaplain to the Oklahoma Association of Chiefs of Police.