Acts of faith

Indira Gandhi, Rudolph Nureyev, Edward Fox - the Rev. Maurice Strike met them all in his former life as an internationally acclaimed theatre-set designer. But God was always waiting in the wings, as he told Shaun Shackleton GOD really wasn't on my side when I set off on my car journey from St Peter Port to St Peter's: the weather was terrible, there were roadworks against me at every turn and one of my windscreen wiper blades wouldn't wipe. But all that changed when I pushed the bell and the back door of St Peter's Rectory opened.

The Rev. Maurice Strike, one-time internationally revered theatre-set designer and now the rector of St Peter's and Torteval, welcomed me, sat me down in the living room next to his baby grand and said: 'I've had a complicated life.' Within the following hour, I'd find out that it has been an exceptional one, too.

A compact man with kind but serious eyes, he immediately struck me as someone who is never bored. Or if he is, it's never for long.

'We'll start with a tour around the house, I think,' he said. And, with the economy and efficiency of a teacher - with me as eager student - he showed me around the tiered maze that is St Peter's Rectory.

Every room and every stair-landing wall was covered in art: pastels, oil paintings, posters, sketches and watercolours and beautifully intricate graphics of his own stage designs.

Works were pointed at, pondered upon and dismissed as dates and names of plays, actors and the historically famous were ticked off in a rapid-fire, machine-gun manner: 'Little Malcolm and his Struggle Against the Eunuchs', 'Costume design for a punk ballet in Toronto, 1989', 'Alice Through the Looking Glass in Manhattan, New York', 'A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to The Forum, Theatre Royal, York'.

We covered two storeys, maybe three

(I lost count) and then went up into the attic to his working studio and archive library. And there he showed me a well-loved and lovingly filled scrapbook of newspaper cuttings and black-and-white photographs.

'Edward Fox and Joanna David, lovely woman,' he said. 'Mrs Gandhi on stage, I'm over there - you can see my head.'

Then there was, 'Eli Wallach in The Diary of Ann Frank - he played the father, his wife the mother and his daughter was Ann - liked him, but the others, mmm...' and, 'Oh, this is a rare one of Rudolph Nureyev with Erik Brun, who helped him defect to the West, in Coppelia in 73 or 75'.

But never once did this sound like bragging or off-hand name-dropping. Maurice seemed to be viewing the memorabilia of his life with the same jaw-dropping awe as I was.

Back downstairs he gave me a brief run-through of his life.

After leaving school, he went to the Wimbledon School of Art where he studied painting, drawing and sculpture and from 1964 to 1985 he designed non-stop.

He has been involved in the Glasgow Citizens' Theatre and the Polka Children's Theatre in Wimbledon. He helped to create the Shaw Festival in Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario, where he worked for a third of the year - the rest he spent touring as far afield as Vancouver to Halifax in Canada and from Philadelphia to New York.

He worked with Peter Stokes, Canada's leading restoration architect, and designed the vestments and altar front for Wells Cathedral.

It's an impressive list of achievements. But Maurice has also designed for more than 110 major productions and 40 of them have been plays by Shaw.

There must have been some fantastic first-night parties.

'One has stayed in mind,' said Maurice. 'Shaw's Heartbreak House in 1968. It's where I met my wife, Nancy.'

Throughout all the achievements and places travelled, I got the feeling that that was one of his proudest moments.

But what of controversy? Surely having spent so long in the theatre and in the company of the famous, he was a party to some misdemeanours?

I imagined Ann Frank-type hidey-holes, forged documents or the make-up people disguising runaways with new identities. But no.

'I gave them work,' he said, in his calm, matter-of-fact way. 'Painting and building and such. It was a terrible war.'

Warming to the subject, he told me that he had attended a party at the Kennedy Centre in Washington just before the Watergate scandal brought down President Richard Nixon.

Then, in more subdued tones, he explained that he'd taken a service at the London Lighthouse for a close friend who had died of Aids in the 80s. I asked him about the Church's views on homosexuality. 'Mine is not a judgemental role,' he explained. 'I cannot condemn one-tenth of humanity.'

Maurice wasn't ordained until he was in his early 40s. But God has always been with him. 'From as long as I remember, I was always 50% of the time in a theatre and 50% of the time in a church. It was there from the beginning.'

And of his late coming to the clergy? 'Through everything, during art school, the theatre work, marriage and starting a family, advice was given to me to wait and to live life.'

I didn't question him, but took this to be divine advice. 'Belief is a life-long quest of discovery but should be approached with maturity,' he said.

But had he encountered any hostility because he was a minister? 'All the people I have met during my time in the Church have been caring, intelligent people. Preconceived ideas about the Church are sad and are usually conducted by the media. The Vicar of Dibley, for instance, or Rowan Atkinson's turn in Four Weddings and a Funeral.'

We both agreed that the clergy was usually depicted as either doddery old men or do-good, motorbike-riding trendies. 'With more earrings than ear lobes,' he added.

But having led such a double life can often cause amusement. 'When I'm in mufti and tell people I used to be a set designer and have worked in the theatre for over 40 years, their ears prick up and they become fascinated. One mention that I'm a rector and I see their eyes start to glaze over. It's very funny.'

He still combines his art with his clerical duties. 'I'm not tied by the Church,' he said. 'I refuse to let that happen. My faith and my art overlap and entwine like a tapestry.'

One of the funniest things that happened to him was the result of back-breaking hard work and self-inflicted insomnia.

'While mounting a production in Glasgow, I didn't sleep for 10 days. The theatre was reputedly haunted, I had painted 16 backcloths on my own and, because there are only certain times when actors are not using the stage, I had to paint the floor at four in the morning.

'All rep. theatres are either closed or closing. It's the same in Guernsey. We need a proper theatre.'

I mentioned the proposed plans for Fort Richmond. 'It's funny that that was reported. Only a week before in a sermon I said that one of the castles should be converted into a theatre. Or Guernsey Brewery. That's empty. Why not a theatre instead of another hotel?'

He also feels that both the talent and the audiences in Guernsey are being let down. 'We need deep plays that should reflect social issues concerning Guernsey. The States spending #12,000 a year on the arts is not moving forward.'

He even proposes that sacred ground should open its doors to the arts. 'I believe that churches should be like they were in medieval times: places where people can meet, play music and put on plays. There's so much talent in this island but nowhere for it to grow.'

None of this was said with a hint of a rant. That's not Maurice's style. All was delivered in a careful, intelligent and measured way.

His favourite artists are Monet, Sisley, John Piper, Titian and Raphael: those who reflect his own art. 'I've never been spiritually moved to be abstract. That must come from the heart. You cannot abstract before you learn to draw.'

Music-wise, it's Mahler and Handel. He plays the piano and goes to Glyndebourne every year.

He's currently reading the works of John Masters.

But mostly you'll find him painting or rediscovering the terraces of his wild and overgrown garden.

He mentioned his two daughters. I said that I, too, have two daughters and that I am pleased that I do because I hate football.

'Oh, I'm glad,' he said. 'So do I. I hate the aggression and the tribalism of it all. Give me a theatre any time, with people clapping and cheering and Benjamin Britten taking a curtain call.'

Later he walked me to the door and introduced me to Nancy, who is arts co-ordinator at the Princess Elizabeth Hospital.

I told him that I write a weekly column for the Guernsey Press and that it must be like writing a weekly sermon, 'except that I can lie in mine but you can't in yours'.

Those kind but serious eyes fixed me and he said: 'Don't be too sure.'

Then he laughed.

Nureyev? Mrs Gandhi? Edward Fox? Eli Wallach? I think they were more privileged in meeting Maurice Strike than he was meeting them.

I know I was.

And guess what? It had stopped raining.