Eccentric priest briefly achieves ecclesiastical prominence (5)
I believe the answer is:
spire
'achieves ecclesiastical prominence' is the definition.
I can't tell whether this definition defines the answer.
'eccentric priest briefly' is the wordplay.
'eccentric' is an anagram indicator.
'briefly' means to remove the last letter.
'priest' with its last letter taken off is 'pries'.
'pries' is an anagram of 'SPIRE'.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for spire that I've seen before include "one over the church?" , "Church steeple" , "Crooked feature in Chesterfield" , "Feature of many churches" , "feature of high church?" .)