A native of Salt Lake City she was raised in a large family who were active members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.  She attended public schools and in her senior year of high school (1957), she lived and studied in New Zealand as an exchange student. 

She began her higher education at Stanford University in 1958, transferred to the University of Michigan, where she was graduated in 1962 with High Honors in Philosophy, and as a member of the Phi Kappa Phi Honorary Society.  She received a Master of Letters (M.Litt) degree in Moral Philosophy from Oxford University in 1968, and a Master of Divinity (M.Div) degree, cum laude, from the Virginia Theological Seminary in 1983.  She holds honorary doctoral degrees from Virginia Theological Seminary, Westminster College in Salt Lake City, the University of Utah, the Church Divinity School of the Pacific, the Salt Lake Community College, and Utah State University. 

Prior to her ordination as a deacon (1983) and priest (1984) in the Episcopal Diocese of Washington, D.C., she taught ethics, history, and literature at the Edmund Burke School in Washington, as well as serving several community organizations. 

 As a priest, Bishop Irish served congregations in the dioceses of Washington, D.C., Virginia, and Michigan.  She was appointed archdeacon in the Diocese of Michigan in 1986, and later served on the staff of the Shalem Institute for Spiritual Formation, and the Washington National Cathedral. 

At this time, she chairs the Board of Directors of the O.C. Tanner Co., in Salt Lake City, and serves on a number of church and community boards including the boards of directors of the Tanner Lectures on Human Values and the Nature Conservancy of Utah, the Standing Committee on Ecumenical Relations for the National Episcopal Church (ECUSA), and the Advisory Board of the Shalem Institute for Spiritual Formation.  She is a Sub-chaplain of the Order of St. John of Jerusalem, and an Honorary Fellow of Linacre College, Oxford.