Tirah Keal is the Founding Executive Pastor of Bloom Haven, a new and inclusive spiritual community center in Huntingdon Valley.
A lifelong Swedenborgian, she is in her final year of seminary and is a candidate for ordination with the Swedenborgian Church of North America, anticipated to occur in the summer of 2027.
Tirah grew up as the daughter of a Swedenborgian minister in a different branch of the tradition than the SCNA, and felt a calling from a young age towards the work of ministry. Because the branch she was raised in does not ordain women, the path she felt pulled towards was not initially open to her. Her journey since has been one of finding — and now building — a Swedenborgian community expansive enough to hold her calling and the wider circle of people she believes that church is meant to welcome.
A resident of Huntingdon Valley since 2008, Tirah brings experience leading worship services, facilitating support groups, and organizing community actions. Her pastoral vision for Bloom Haven is rooted in the conviction that true spirituality is something we have to live daily. She describes Bloom Haven as a brave and growing space that asks not for perfection but for authenticity, empathy, vulnerability, and humility — and she is especially committed to offering a spiritual home to those who feel hurt, afraid, invisible, lonely, or disconnected, with a foundational welcome for LGBTQIA+ people.
Tirah is an active mother of five, several of whom are members of the LGBTQIA+ community. This reality has shaped both her advocacy and her understanding of what an inclusive church must actually look like in practice. Through Bloom Haven, she hopes to gather a community that cooks, worships, and eats together, serves its neighbors in the greater Philadelphia area, and strives, week by week, to love more deeply, live more wisely, and become more fully human.