Father Richard Martindale was born in Mishawaka, Indiana (near South Bend) where his parents were attending Bethel College.

By the age of six, the family had moved from there to Western Ohio and then on to Phoenix, Arizona. His family was very active in a small denomination, the Missionary Church, which he jokes was "so conservative it would make the Baptists look liberal." His parents were both teachers, though his father served as pastor for a church in Ohio and later as a supply preacher. Except for one year when the family moved to rural Ohio, Rich lived in Phoenix until he left to pursue a degree in Psychology from Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland.

Upon graduation, Rich was commissioned as an officer in the Medical Service Corps of the U.S. Army and served tours of duty in Kentucky, Texas, Louisiana, the Federal Republic of Germany, and North Carolina. He is a combat veteran of the Persian Gulf War and earned the Expert Field Medical Badge, the Parachutist Badge, the Air Assault Badge and was awarded numerous merit and service medals.

Father Rich left the Army after nearly thirteen years of active service to follow a call to Holy Orders in the Episcopal Church and Virgina Theological Seminary. He was ordained to the Diaconate by the Right Reverend B. Sidney Sanders, Bishop of East Carolina and to the Priesthood by the Right Reverend Robert O. Miller, Ninth Bishop of Alabama. Before being called as Rector of Trinity Church, he was Dean of Saint Mark's Pro-Cathedral, Hastings in the Diocese of Nebraska, and served as Curate of Saint John's Episcopal Church, Decatur in the Diocese of Alabama.

Rich and his wife, Jenny have been married twenty-five years and have two grown sons. J.D. is a graduate student in applied mathematics at the University of North Carolina, and Kyle and his wife, Brittany live in Hastings, Nebraska where he is in his final year at Hastings College.