CREEDE HINSHAW: Clergy and crime the new mix

He is a bicycle-riding, clergy collar-wearing vicar who never seems to pedal his bicycle uphill.

His parish secretary wears a permanent scowl, is also his housekeeper and admonishes him for his own good. He is a tested war veteran haunted by the demons of battle, which perhaps explains why he drinks too much and is unable to enter into satisfactory romantic relationships.

He apparently serves a parish in the most dramatic locale in all of England because every week a murder or disturbing death happens there, a mystery which he and his best friend, a police detective, solve.

If you are a fan of the British TV series “Grantchester,” you recognize that I am describing Sidney Chambers, the fictional Church of England priest serving in the village for which the series is named. I’ve served some rural assignments before, including six weeks in a small English town, but never in a place that included such mayhem or murder. Maybe I was just blindly unaware of the seamier side of life that this handsome vicar confronts week after gripping week.

Clergy seem to be subjects ripe for portrayal in print and on the screen. I could name many examples. A couple of decades ago, readers were raving over The Mitford Series, best selling novels by Jan Karon set in the fictional North Carolina town of Mitford and (without the murders) centered on Episcopal priest Father Timothy Kavanaugh.

My wife and I have enjoyed “Grantchester,” now in its second season on PBS. Suffering withdrawal symptoms with the conclusion of “Downton Abbey,” we began watching this British production thereafter and, though I have some trouble understanding the British dialect, we are pleasingly entertained weekly.

The vicar, Sidney Chambers, is depicted fairly robustly, considering this is a 60-minute drama. Almost every segment depicts him preaching in his church and, thanks to the unreality of television, his words are always incisive and compelling. I wish I could have preached with such authority and wisdom. He understands repentance, intuitively grasps the depth of the human dilemma and is full of the grit, if not always faith, that keeps him moving forward.

The loneliness of the priest is a compelling part of this series, reminding me of the depression and alienation felt by the fictional priest in Georges Bernanos’ acclaimed novel “Diary of a Country Priest,” describing a young Catholic priest serving an isolated French parish. Ministry can be lonely; this calling is not for the faint of heart or for one who requires constant affirmation.

Sidney Chambers never meets with the finance committee, contends with the deacons, visit the hospitals, teaches Bible school or eats casseroles at church dinners. Those things would be too ordinary for television. Instead he solves one mystery per week, while never quite solving the mystery of his own existence, or perhaps his own relationship to God. It makes for good viewing.

Email Creede Hinshaw, a retired Methodist minister, at [email protected].