Her mother, a registered nurse with theatrical ambitions herself, moved Church at the age of five to Hollywood to pursue a career in acting.

In 1953, Church made her Broadway debut in the role of Madge Owens, replacing Janice Rule, in William Inge's Picnic with Ralph Meeker.

Church was featured as Helen White in Sherwood Anderson's Winesburg, Ohio alongside Dorothy McGuire and James Whitmore.

[12] In November 1964, she married Broadway play producer Norman Twain in Bridgetown, Barbados at the home of stage designer Oliver Messel.

[citation needed] Church's great-aunt was educator Mary Florence Denton, a longtime faculty member at Doshisha University in Kyoto.