G'day
This one is from one of the settings I submitted to the WotC setting search.
RELIGION
Most of the peoples of the Great Vale and surrounding areas are monotheistic. They even agree that the various distinct sects are all devoted to, and that all clerics obtain their powers from, the same God. Under such conditions you might expect a broad religious tolerance, or even that people might doubt the importance of the differences between the sects. But this is not what we find. There is a vigorous controversy on various theological points and about what God wants of clerics and of people generally. Some clerics even go so far as to accuse rival sects of embezzling the power of God and misleading their followers into sin.
Some sceptics openly doubt that God can possibly care about the contentious issues, since He dispenses clerical spells to members of vociferously rival clergies. And yet it must be noted that clerics who make this a justification for permissiveness or indifference not only fail to advance through the hierarchies, but fail to gain cleric levels. Some people conclude that God has laid down a number of distinct paths proper to different people. Others whisper that there are in fact several rival gods: but these are condemned, even persecuted, as heretics. The most dangerous hint that clerical powers might be gained by zeal in any cause.
In those areas that were parts of the erstwhile Elvish Empire there is an established Church with a complex hierarchy and with representatives in every settlement. The whole empire was divided up into parishes, each with a priest and church. Parishes were organised into deaneries, deaneries into dioceses each with a bishop, cathedral, and chapter, dioceses into archdioceses each with an archbishop, and archdioceses into provinces each with a primate. For the most part the Church has survived the fall of the Empire, but its doctrine and liturgy have be reformed by the Legion of Heaven (see below). The Great Vale is an archdiocese of the Province of Manch, and the Strath Michel is another. But the Church never held sway in the Gwlad Cenenryth (which is druidic), nor in the Alten nor the Cairnmell highlands (where the dwarvish ministerial form of worship holds sway.
Each Church parish used to correspond to a manor, and its priest was supported as part of the manorial system of the Empire. When the elvish government withdrew the funding of the parishes and the appointment of the priests fell into the hands of the lords who took over the manors. The Legion of Heaven purged this corrupt influence from the Church. Bishops now appoint the parish priests, and the funding of the Church is guaranteed by tithes. In addition to which the Church has gradually accumulated rich abbeys, glebes, and prebends.
A brief sketch of each sect follows.
Druidic
Druids hold that God is immanent and concerned with other parts of Creation no less than with Man. They teach that people and communities ought to live harmoniously with other God’s other creatures, doing no harm to beast or tree, and taking no more than their share of God’s bounty. Although druids have a judicial position in the society of the Cenenryth, they do not preach a divine ordinance for social relations, personal behaviour, etc. Divine services are a gift of God to the individual and the community: participation is not a duty of the individual to God. Druids teach a belief in reincarnation, and their ‘reincarnation’ spell makes souls inaccessible to ‘raise dead’ and ‘resurrection’.
Most druids are ‘children of the Oak’ (conceived during certain orgiastic ceremonies among the Manneth) trained from puberty by the Order of Druids in the Gwlad Cenenryth. But even in areas where druids are persecuted as heretics (as where the Legion of Heaven holds sway) there are a few secret druids passing on their teachings and ordinations by a system of apprenticeship. Green Elves seem to favour the druidic religion: their own druids may be found in some green-elf bands. Sea Elves tend to concur with druidic teaching, but their druid-equivalents enjoy a special ordination and use a different set of spells (more suitable for life at sea and on the shores than the standard druids’ list).
Ministerial
Dwarvish ministers of God emphasise God’s role as the guiding light of Truth. They hold that God is transcendental, but that worshippers are capable of a personal relationship with God without sacerdotal mediation. Very much focused on the purity of the Spirit, dwarvish ministers consider the Flesh chiefly a source of temptation and corruption, and the World as a gross thing of inferior matter. Clerics are hired (or not) by congregations (through a Parish Commission) to guide and instruct them (and dispense divine spells), and remain subject to the discipline of their employers. Or the clerics set up as free-lance preachers and attempt to live by taking up collections. There is no church hierarchy.
Dwarvish religious teaching is rather severe, and stresses a personal integrity and stern self-discipline that pervade the whole of life. Sin is seen as an effect and sign of laxity and lack of integrity, not a spiritual force of itself. Those who die in righteousness spend eternity in the light of the presence of God, even though their souls might have had to have been hammered straight after a long career of sin. Contrariwise, a weak and fickle soul might be condemned to the Outer Darkness though the person committed no sin in outward action. The dwarvish religious tradition does not feature confession or absolution, and such penances as it allows are reformative exercises, not ritual cleansings.
Clerics in this tradition may choose from among the domains Truth (knowledge), Light, Luck, and Protection.
Orthodox (Nonconformist)
A few priests attempt to continue the religious forms that were established for the use of its subjects by the Elvish Empire. They consider themselves orthodox, but the Legion of Heaven majority call them ‘Nonconformist’ priests. The Legion of Heaven has gradually excluded the Nonconformists from all episcopal sees and from nearly all parishes (though it does recognise the ordination of Nonconformist priests as valid). Most Nonconformist priests therefore subsist on fees and collections, as mendicants, or as chaplains to wealthy Nonconformist worshippers. Nonconformist priest traditionally take vows of celibacy and obedience.
Orthodox teaching is that God is transcendental, and that He created the world as a gift for Man, who is therefore lord and master of the lesser beasts and plants and so forth. In gratitude for this gift and the continual gifts dispensed by God’s clerics, Man owes it to God to keep God’s Ordinances. These Ordinances are quite detailed, and describe an orderly, peaceful society of diligent, meek, temperate, forgiving people. (Canonically, this code prescribes keepings one’s place in the social order, but this aspect receives little emphasis in these days when Nonconformism is associated with resistance to the Hote nobility.) The Commandments specify a round of fasts and observances, including four obligatory church services a worshipper must attend every year. Apart from these, attendance at ceremonies (including daily prayers and weekly Communion) is an opportunity to share in God’s bounty, not a duty of the worshipper to God.
According to Nonconformists God rewards the righteous in the afterlife and destroys the wicked. Those who are not utterly wicked but who come to judgement with a burden of sin must have their sins purged away by a period of punishment. Fortunately, God’s clerics can absolve the sins of those who are truly penitent, this being proven by confession and penance.
Orthodox (Nonconformist) clerics may choose among the domains Healing, Justice, and Protection.
The Legion of Heaven
The Legion of Heaven is a reform movement that took over the Church after the collapse of the Elvish Empire. Among its aims were to free worshippers to discharge those social roles (such as defending the community under arms) abandoned by the departed elves, and to purge the Church of those secular influences that pervaded it when local interests took over the former Imperial government’s role in Church administration. In effect, the Legion of Heaven made the Church a separate clerical state within the State: indeed it pervades many states, and none of them is the more stable for its influence. It also claimed to replace the Divine Ordinances with a context-sensitive Righteousness in which justice seems to be a greater virtue than forgiveness.
The Legion teaches that God is the transcendental creator and ruler of Heaven and Earth. Man is God’s tenant and vassal, entitled to receive from God through God’s social order his daily needs, and obliged to pay to God, through the social order, those returns due from one of his individual position. Clerics are God’s bailiffs on Earth, responsible for ensuring that every tenant receives what is due to him and delivers what is due to others and to God. It is the especial responsibility of clerics to ensure that everyone pays God due reverence, praying at morning, noon, and night, and attending Service every week.
In the teaching of the Legion sin is an offence against God, which God is entitled to punish either in the afterlife or by inflicting a penance in this, or which God is entitled to forgive entirely if it serves His purposes. Genuine repentance may influence God (and indeed He is held always to forgive the genuinely penitent sinner), but it is not a necessity for forgiveness. Thus, for example, it is within the power of the Church to issue to a soldier an indulgence to kill in the course of a just war, or when protecting the Faithful against heretics, unbelievers, enemies of God, or even civil insurrection, and the soldier need not repent of the killings to escape purgatory.
Obviously, this doctrine gives the Church (which is to say clerics) a great deal of power that might be abused. And indeed the Legion seems to use that power to gain ever more property and authority to itself. But the Legion is vigilant against clerics who use the authority of their office for personal advantage. The attitude to clerical spells is different: these are granted by God directly to the cleric to use as he sees fit, and their use is not part of their administration of God’s government on Earth. So use of spells on personal business is not considered to be improper so long as the business itself is not improper, and it is even permitted to accept fees for casting clerical spells.
The Legion of Heaven is organised into five cohorts:
The Blue Cohort
The secular clergy of the Legion of Heaven make up the Blue Cohort. In this branch of the church are found almost all parish priests, deans, cathedral canons, bishops, archbishops, etc. They are chiefly responsible for conducting services for the laity and dispensing clerical magic for the benefit of worshippers. The territorial government of the Church is also in their hands.
The ‘blue friars’ take vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience. But their vow of poverty only forbids the amassing of personal wealth. It does not prevent them from husbanding the wealth of the Church, nor from enjoying luxury at the expense of the Church or other employers. They dress in blue cassocks and mantles.
Domains: Healing and Protection.
The Grey Cohort
The ‘grey friars’ are the Legion’s missionaries and preachers. They proselytise in heathen lands. More often they preach among the poor and ignorant to combat heresy. Itinerant and often mendicant, the grey friars take vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience, but their sworn obedience is to their own order, not to the territorial hierarchy. They are not supposed to dispense Church services to the laity except in emergencies, but in practice some do so, and thus gain the confidence of marginal communities: the Grey Friars can be very understanding about what people do out of necessity. This diminishes the power and revenues of the Blue Cohort to some extent, but it provides a relief valve for clerical-lay tensions. It also means that members of the Grey Cohort are desirable confessors and chaplains for rulers and courtiers. Many also serve as diplomats and chancellors.
Domains: Knowledge, Luck.
The Red Cohort
The red friars are the Legion’s military arm, and they include paladins and even lay ‘confreres’ as well as armed clerics. They fight wars against rival religions on occasion, but more often they protect the Church, pilgrims, and even the poor and sick from bandits, oppressive lords, monsters, etc. And when military needs are not pressing they turn their Healing realm to the cure of the sick rather than the healing of their comrades’ wounds. There is usually a hospital of the Red Cohort in every city that has a bishop and cathedral.
The clerics among the red friars vow themselves to poverty, chastity, and obedience. The paladins’ vow of poverty is modified to allow for war-gear, and they swear to celibacy rather than chastity. But on the other hand they add a vow of valour that provides a more-than-compensating mortification of the flesh. Besides, this way confreres on temporary vows are not obliged to divorce.
The Red Cohort dispenses church services only to its own members, the sick in its hospitals, and its confreres. A few political figures serve a while so as to get Red-Cohort chaplains and a little independence of episcopal influence.
Domains: Healing, War.
The White Cohort
The white friars are the Legion’s scholars and teachers. Living mostly in urban monasteries they manufacture books, teach literacy to the young, run seminaries, and devote themselves to prayer and study. There is usually a monastery of the White cohort in every city with a cathedral and bishop.
The white friars take vows of poverty, but their monasteries and nunneries are often rich. On the other hand the vow of chastity is strictly enforced, and the level of obedience required is second only to that demanded of a red friar in battle.
Domains: Protection, Knowledge.
The Black Cohort
The black friars hunt out heresy and corruption in the Church. Bishops may prosecute naughty clergy, but it is always the black friars who judge and punish them. As a combination Inquisition and Church Internal Affairs they are greatly feared. But since they can use ‘Detect Thoughts’ and ‘Circle of Truth’ spells they do not need torture. And they refuse to punish people for holding erroneous opinions: only if a heretic persists in teaching heresy despite correction will they condemn him. On the other hand they do persecute persistent druids and heretical preachers, and disrupt heretical and druidic services when they can. And they hunt down and destroy Witches, demon-worshippers, and other avowed servants of evil.
At least one black friar is attached to each episcopal see, as the bishop’s confessor and chancellor of the episcopal court. Others come and go, subject to strict internal discipline but immune from the authority of the bishops.
Domains: Justice, Protection.
Illuminist
Illuminism is not strictly a religious view, but more of an ethical philosophy. Illuminist monks disavow any ability to speak with assurance about God’s nature or will, and if asked say frankly that they do not know. But illuminist monks do teach right conduct, and they are recognised as holy men: indeed many people recognise them as more plainly holy than any cleric. The Black Cohort of the Legion of Heaven leaves illuminists alone because they promulgate no errors about God. But the Blue Cohort view them with some hostility: respect for illuminist candour and piety is undermining support for the Church, and an alarming number of young people are more interested in the sermons of illuminist sages than those of any blue friar.
Illuminist philosophy teaches that virtue is the only good, and that its essence lies in self-control and independence of outside things. True and lasting happiness is identical with wisdom, and can be found only by one who is free from passion, unmoved by joy or grief, and submissive to natural law. Although the sage is not swayed by his own discomfort, he recognises the distress of the weak, and will neither do harm nor allow others to do harm to anyone.
In Amhara and Fex there are illuminist monasteries into which students may retreat from the world and its temptations. But there are no such in the Great Vale or anywhere near it. The illuminists in this region are mostly of the persuasion that a true sage does not need to hide from the world because he is genuinely untouched by it. Further, many feel an obligation to act virtuously in the world, to relieve the distress of the weak and quiet the convulsions of the mighty. Some advanced students and even sages do not see fit to become monks at all, but hope to do more good as householders and even public administrators.
Some illuminists earn fame and praise by their ostentatious disdain for pleasure, convenience, and comfort. Others eschew asceticism, and point out that pride and ambition (as they depend for their gratification on the astonishment of the ignorant) are deceptions that entangle the student in the world as surely as avarice, gluttony, anger, or love.
A generation ago the only illuminists known in the Great Vale were wandering mendicants from Fex: tall, gaunt, and black. Now Manche, Manneth, and even Hote are seen in the sandals and black pleated tunic of the illuminist monk, with staff and begging-bowl.
Diabolists
They are rarely associated with any sort of organised worship, but a small number of ‘Dark Priests’ gain clerical powers from evil sources. Some merely conjure demons and ‘compel’ them to give up powers which the diabolists claim to use for good, or at least neutrally. Others candidly worship the demons. Others yet worship a supposed enemy or dark equal of God, variously named. Some of the most revolting claim to represent God’s left hand or God’s dark half. These are all pursued with the utmost rigour by everyone from Black Cohort fanatics to illuminist sceptics. Possible spiritual corruption aside, witches are extremely dangerous to their neighbours.
Living as they must in utter secrecy, diabolists have no recognisable vestments, nor, apparently, any coherent doctrine.
Domains: choose two from Air, Death, Destruction, Earth, Fire, Trickery, Water.
Regards,
Agback
