Race to pursue the point of The Church, from the start (12)
I believe the answer is:
steeplechase
'the start' is the definition.
(thesaurus)
'race to pursue' is the wordplay.
'race' becomes 'steeple' (I can't explain this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'to pursue' becomes 'chase' (chasing is a kind of pursuing).
'steeple'+'chase'='STEEPLECHASE'
'the point of the church from' acts as a link.
I am not very happy about this link. Some or all of it may belong to another bit of the clue.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for steeplechase that I've seen before include "Horse race with ditches and hedges" , "Non-flat horse race" , "Race over fences" , "run?" , "Horse race with jumps and ditches" .)