Religion: St. Francis-in-the-Fields

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"Owsley's Fire Escape." For more than two years Rector Clingman's congregation met in their former Negro church with its old memorial windows ("Given in Memory of Big Boy Howard"). Two potbellied stoves heated it, none too well; Joe Heitzman's boat rental place next door brought confused customers stumbling into church. This spring the congregation moved into a new $200,000 church. The members voted to name it "St. Francis-in-the-Fields"—though not before some friends of Distiller Owsley Brown ("Old Forester" and other brands) had needled him with such suggestions as "Owsley's Fire Escape" and "St. Owsley's in the Old Forester."

The people of St. Francis-in-the-Fields consider themselves a long way from Christian perfection. Says Rector Clingman: "We're not good people. We're not a collection of saints but a group of sinners . . . who are trying to live by the lines from St. Paul: Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners."

This week, when they kneel on Christmas Eve with the rest of Christendom to celebrate the Savior's birth, the sinners of St. Francis-in-the-Fields will begin their fourth year as a Christian congregation.