Alzrius
The EN World kitten
Raven Crowking said:Okay, I do understand the advantages of having a Church, but under the circumstances 3.X rules set up, why does one need a god to have a church? Liturgy could as easily be philosophical and theosophical, right? If the powers stay the same, then what difference does it make to the people making up the church?
There could be several reasons why gods have churches, as opposed to non-god-worshipping divine spellcasters.
The first one could be that the gods don't want there to be secular churches. If it poaches their faithful ("hey, join our order. It has no gods to kowtow to!") then even a good deity would want their worshippers to tear it down.
This is getting more abstract, but a god can also do things for their worshippers. This doesn't have a mechanic, but divine favor can play a role that isn't filled by clerics who have no higher authority (including but not limited to knowing where their souls go when they die).
Finally, the idea of a church can also extend into the Outer Planes. That is, your god has a home realm, which is populated with servitor creatures that would be friendly to you (e.g. angels, proxies, and such).
Ultimately, there's more to answer this question than mechanics.