Aim for a high place in the church (6)

I believe the answer is:

aspire

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'aim for' is the definition.
(I've seen this before)

'a high place in the church' is the wordplay.
'high' suggests taking the first letters (I've seen 'highest of' mean this (top letter - down clues only)).
'in the' indicates putting letters inside.
'church' becomes 'sire' (I can't explain this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
The first letter of 'place' is 'p'.
'p' put within 'sire' is 'spire'.
'a'+'spire'='ASPIRE'

Can you help me to learn more?

(Other definitions for aspire that I've seen before include "Have a strong desire to reach an objective" , "Long" , "Seek (to do something)" , "Hope (to do something)" , "Aim at, work towards" .)

I've seen this clue in The Globe and Mail.

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