With nowhere to go way up north, heartless ship's officer is found behind church consumed by the papers
I believe the answer is:
icebound
'with nowhere to go way up north heartless ship's officer is found behind' is the definition.
I can't judge whether this definition defines the answer.
'church consumed by the papers' is the wordplay.
I cannot really see how this works, but
'church' could be 'ce' (abbreviation for Church of England) and 'ce' is found within the answer.
This may be the basis of clue (or it may be nonsense).
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for icebound that I've seen before include "Locked in by frozen water" , "Like ships trapped near poles" , "Trapped by frozen sea" , "Stuck in frozen water" , "(Of ship) trapped by frozen water" .)