"If there is any consolation of love, if there is any fellowship of the spirit, if any affection and compassion, make my joy complete by being of the same mind, maintaining the same love, united in spirit, with our Divine Lords."
-Philip Tymotus, Chosen of the Lady, speaking at midwinter mass in 1102 FR.
Overview
In our world Faith is a question of philosophy. In Deomeidh Faith is a proven fact. It is hard to deny a religion whose deities walk the earth performing miracles and preaching salvation. The Angelic Church went from nothing to being one of the most powerful organizations in all of Deomeidh in the course of a few generations. Today the Church controls the country Machair, and has influence through all the northern nations. It has the power of the celestials, the resources of an entire nation, and the Faith of millions. When the Church takes action, it can change the course of history.
History
The Angelic Church can trace its roots back to the breaking of Rowan’s sword at the end of the Age of Steel. The first few years of the new age were chaotic, with celestials of the first tier appearing at random, and often killing each other with neither gaining dominion. The Church got its first break just three years after Rowan’s sword shattered when Nodhaduil gained dominion. He received aid from none other than Fianna Aidmheil, Rowan’s first student, when she struck down his Infernal opponent. Fianna remained friendly to the Angelic Church for the rest of her days.
Nodhaduil established the first official Church near the city of Lios Athar in present-day Fail-Cala. As word of his healing abilities spread, followers flocked to worship him and swore to follow his doctrine. Over the next century, the Church spread throughout much of the Fail-Cala region, and gained footholds in Sorcha and distant Machair.
The Angelic Church lost the first Faith War in 123, as the Angelic forces were caught off-guard by the Faith-binding of Edgemasters. Church leaders, who were already building the a complex hierarchy to govern their growing flock, were determined not to lose the second. By the time of the second Faith War, five Edgemasters waited to Faith-bind the manifesting celestial, armies were being marshaled, and the Faithful prepared for a massive war. There were but a few minor skirmishes before the war ended with the Demon’s betrayal by one of her own. The inadvertent victory was the beginning of an ascendency in Church power that lasted for centuries.
The war between the Faiths remained in the Angels’ favour until they lost the fourth Faith War in 616 FR. The Angelic Faith waned until Camille Liusaidh won the fifth Faith War in 749 with her first Strike of Faith. In the years following, the Church saw a massive upsurge of popularity focused in the Fail-Cala regions. Religious fervor reached a crescendo by 800 FR and the Church began its most bloody crusade in history.
The Fail-Calan region, the birthplace of the organized Church, saw the manifestation of the Angel Grand Lord Saranam. The military mobilization that followed occurred on a scale that had never been seen before or since. Amongst a flurry of lesser celestial manifestations, the world split into those who supported the Angels, and those who sided with the Demons. The True-Faith war devastated Deomeidh. Atrocities were common, as the Angel (and his Demonic counterpart) declared that the killing of any unbeliever was a just and righteous act. Whole towns were put to the sword. Violent gangs roamed cities on the pretext of ‘rooting out traitors.’ The battles of the war involved tens of thousands of troops, and the execution of captured prisoners was the norm.
Scholars predicted that the True-Faith War would be ‘the Last War,’ and the victor would rule all of Deomeidh. It didn’t happen that way thanks, once again, to the intervention of Camille. Even as her Strike of Faith killed Saranam and his counterpart, her Hunters engaged in a wholesale slaughter of celestials and their servants. No Angel (or Demon) above the second tier survived the Hunters’ purge, and the Church fell apart.
In 808 FR, the True-Faith War was over, a third of the population was dead, and the Church was a desiccated carcass. While small perishes persisted, the grand organization of the previous centuries was all but gone. The one place that retained a notable Church presence was the then poor nation of Machair. The rest of the world focused on the immediate concern of survival, and the Church faded into obscurity.
In 921, with the Church ailing, a desperate Angel Lord by the name of Urtog began experimenting with sharing her power with her followers. Her objective was to cause spontaneous manifestations - bringing Angels into being without Demonic counterparts, but her experiments proved fruitless for twelve years before she stumbled on ‘broken bridge’ in the human soul leading back to the celestial forces. She used her power to act as a bridge, hoping to bring Angelic power into her followers and creating new Angels. Instead, the followers gained access to the Angelic power without an Angelic consciousness manifesting in the host. Those ‘Chosen’ by Urtog gained celestial-like powers and became heralds of her Faith. Creating the Chosen began a religious revival that grew until the sixth Faith War created the new theocracy of Machair in 1023 under the dominion of ‘The Lady.’
After the Lady’s victory, Church tactics changed. Instead of trying to convert the common people to the Faith, and creating massive armies to push its agenda with lords and kings, the Angels became the lords with the Lady ruling as Queen. She established a kind of ‘benevolent dictatorship’ within Machair and brought the country from poverty to prosperity in less than 20 years. She established embassies in every major country that not only brokered trading contracts for high quality Machairian goods, but also acted as missionary enclaves, spreading the Faith, with a focus on the upper classes who ruled in each nation.
Thanks to careful planning, and capable missionaries, the Church drummed up enough Faith to manifest another 4th tier Angel in Farran Shenn in 1075 FR. When the Church lost the ensuing Faith War a year later, it destroyed the Church’s foothold in the south, but did not affect the Church’s prevalence in Machair and much of the north.
Today, the Lady is months away from her ascension back into the heavens, and the Church has no clear leader to replace her. Machair is still a stronghold of the Faith, while Durlus and Sorcha both favour Angels to Demons. This preference is shared by the nobility and common folk alike. Fail-Calans still hold onto centuries of bitterness from the True-Faith War, and are wary of the Church. As a result, there are but a few small chapels scattered throughout the Fail-Calan region. Aigeann remains a secular nation with no one religion endorsed by the government, and despite its efforts, the Church is lagging behind the Demons in the race to gain the people’s Faith. Alainn maintains religious neutrality despite the threat of invasion from Demon-controlled Brail Corsa. The Alainnian leadership, however, may be on the verge of a religious conversion, as the Church has made massive covert ‘donations’ to the Alainn defence coffers. Farran Shenn, once a bastion of Faith, has fallen back into spiritualism, and the Church’s efforts to make inroads there have met with little success. The future of the Church lies with the succession in Machair. If a strong leader steps up to replace the Lady, then the Church can maintain is current position. If a weak leader, or several competing leaders, emerges, the Church will lose ground to the Demons in the coming decades. For the Church to increase its presence in the world would require nothing short of another victorious Faith War.
Beliefs and Goals
The Church’s often stated goal is the Faith of the people. Faith means two things: reverence, and obedience. Reverence is shown with a short morning and evening prayer, and attending a Church service on the evening of every sixth day. The services are held in chapels scattered about the lands. An Angelic chapel is a circular, domed building ranging in size from a tiny hovel, to a massive cathedral. Obedience is shown with a tithe of 10% of a follower’s earnings, and living in accordance with a collection of Church laws known as the Edicts.
Those who show reverence and obedience receive the protection of the Church. Church protection includes the nightmare suppressing abilities of the celestials, (see the Celestial section) the healing powers of the Angels and Chosen, and even free representation in legal disputes. The Faithful are also given the promise of their souls ascending to the heavens to join the Angelic host. The ascension of the soul is disputed by those who reject the Faith, as no proof of it has ever been offered.
Methods
The modern Angelic Church is focused on converting the leaders of communities and nations, hoping to create religious states like Machair. It holds up the success of Machair as proof of its superior methods, and is not above ‘donations’ to sway leaders.
When trying to convert the common people, the Church offers the standard protection, but under the Lady, it has begun trying to show the smaller and simpler advantages to Church life. For example, the Edicts include rules about bathing, food storage, and sanitation that make people healthier. The Church challenges people (with monetary enticements) to try living by the Edicts for a month to see if their lives improve. The strategy is often successful, though it has backfired from time to time: some people realize that the umbrella of the Church is not required when living by the Edicts that improve everyday life, and while they follow the Edicts, they continue to reject the Faith.
The central tenet in the Church’s Edicts is love: Love the Church, love your family, love your neighbours. In love one will find reverence for the Faith, obedience to the laws, and ultimate salvation. Unlike some real world religions, the Angelic Faith does not extend love to unbelievers, as they believe that people must share Faith in order to love each other. Detractors to the religion claim that this belief gives the Angels an excuse to order the slaughter of their enemies. It might even be true.
Members
Membership in the Angelic Church is somewhere between 6 and 7 million people, with over 3.5 million members living in Machair. At any time, there are between 500 and 600 Angel Chosen, most living in or near major cities or chapels, as well there are about a thousand Angels of the First Tier, maybe 500 Angels of the Second Tier, and less than 100 Angels of the Third Tier, for a total of about 1600 Angels, and just over 2100 if one includes the Chosen. While 2100 beings of immense power seems like a lot, it is not enough to manage an organization with over 6 million members.
The Church has a massive bureaucracy that extends from the lowest levels of power up to the halls of the elite in Cathair Aisling. Their ranks are:
- Manachs (monks) who preside over small parishes of less than 30 people. They are often the sole religious figures in remote towns or villages.
- Sagarts (priests) run small Churches with membership under 500 people. Larger Churches will have several Manachs to assist the Sagart. A Sagart in a more remote area may have several Manachs in distant parishes reporting to him.
- Ard-Sagarts (high priests) are always Chosen and preside over the largest Churches in the Faith. An Ard-Sagart’s parish may include thousands of people with several smaller chapels under its umbrella.
- Aspicks (bishops) are always Chosen and control whole regions of worshippers. There 24 serving Aspicks in the current iteration of the Church, though the number fluctuates.
- Ard-Aspick (arch bishop) is the highest rank that a non-Angel can achieve in the Church and commands the 24 Aspicks. The last Ard-Aspick died in 1120, and the Lady did not select a replacement, as she saw no suitable candidates. The lack of an Ard-Aspick has made the contentious issue of the Lady’s succession even worse.
There are theoretical equivalencies between the Angel Tiers and the Church’s ranks, but in practice, most humans in the Church will defer to most Angels. An Ard-Sagart is considered to be equivalent to a 1st tier Angel, an Aspick is equal to a 2nd tier Angel, and the Ard-Aspick would be equal to a 3rd tier Angel.
Some notable members of the Church include:
The Lady - Current head of the Church (see Notable Personalities)
Areas of Operation
The Church’s headquarters are in Machair, with chapels scattered through all the lands, with even a few underground groups in Braile Corsa. Besides Machair, the Church is strongest in Durlus and Sorcha, though it holds little political power in either nation.
