HFQ Official Snippet #20

Randomiser wrote:

PeterZ wrote:
If given the chance, Archbishop Maikel will opt to persuade rather than compel. Overrunning the armies of an intransigent CoGA is unavoidable. Overrunning the armies of the CoGA seeking to negotiate is quite another thing.

Don't 'persuade' and 'compel' kind of run into one another when the persuasion is done at the end of a war the persuaders are about to convincingly win? And let's not kid ourselves that the other side will be considering negotiations until that is the case. Even Duchairn still thinks the CoGA's theological stance and position in society are right and God-ordained. He hates the war and many of the hierarchy's attitudes and actions, but he believes in the Church; it may have lost its way but hasn't lost its mandate to care for and guide all of God's children on Safehold.

chrisd wrote:

Randomiser wrote:*quote="Peter2"*

There have been all sorts of governments, but From what I can see, those where ultimate power has been in the hands of the priesthood were far and away the worst. The ability to shift accountability for their actions on to the shoulders of their God(s) seemed to relieve their consciences of any burden of responsibility for the most heinous crimes. They could put their hands on their hearts and say "God wills it" to justify the vilest actions.

*quote*

That kind of anti-religious allegation is often bandied around these days. Then I think of Stalin, Hitler, Pol Pot and even Mao, the devastation they caused and the millions of deaths they were responsible for, and wonder which religious 'governments' were so overwhelmingly worse than them. Have you any suggestions? Or are you willing to apologise for that piece of anti-religious prejudice?

Aren't "Marxism" and "Marxism/Leninism" religions to their deluded supporters?

PeterZ wrote:Of course the Church is still mandated to care for all of God's children. The CoGA hierarchy has failed this charge. The CoC hierarchy has not. Making the argument that God accepts the CoC as part of His Church is part of the theological negotiations that must happen. Would it be more persuasive for the devout loyalist to have this discussion when the CoGA still have some choices or after all their choices have been destroyed?

Personally, I believe that holding those discussions before all is lost emphasizes the importance of the negotiations. That the negotiations might yet save something that otherwise would be lost.

Randomiser wrote:
Don't 'persuade' and 'compel' kind of run into one another when the persuasion is done at the end of a war the persuaders are about to convincingly win? And let's not kid ourselves that the other side will be considering negotiations until that is the case. Even Duchairn still thinks the CoGA's theological stance and position in society are right and God-ordained. He hates the war and many of the hierarchy's attitudes and actions, but he believes in the Church; it may have lost its way but hasn't lost its mandate to care for and guide all of God's children on Safehold.

JeffEngel wrote:

McGuiness wrote:The EoC may negotiate in Zion or at the Temple itself - given the Millennial return of the archangels, the EoC has to have either control or unrestricted access to the temple before that happens. I'm sure that Staynair will be involved in the religious negotiations, but he knows that the CoGA (and the CoC) are both abominations created to trap mankind on Safehold forever. His approach thus far has been a kind and gentle call for everyone to develop a personal relationship with God. (Oddly enough eliminating the archangels as intermediaries.)

Siddarmark won't be involved in those negotiations. It will be clearing any remnants of CoGA forces, inquisitors, and TLs responsible for the atrocities that occurred during the occupation.

Since the return of the archangels may lead to the Big Reveal, which many of us expect, any changes made to the CoGA may not last long. A reformed abomination is still an abomination. The CoC is merely a kinder and gentler abomination. (Although Staynair has been trying to preach around the Writ by emphasizing God and minimizing the archangels.)

Staynair may be more worried by the Big Reveal than most, since he realizes how many people will cast God aside as being part of the Big Lie, while others will refuse to believe there could be a Big Lie at all. We've been warned that the religious wars that will occur after the truth comes out will be bigger than the current war, probably because numerous schisms will be at each other's throats. So regardless of what Staynair thinks or hopes or negotiates, Safehold is going to experience a wave of religious wars. Throw in a few slave rebellions and things are going to get ugly!

Staynair can't accomplish all he'd like to before the Reveal, or immediately even if that happened tomorrow. He'd like to take the role of force out of matters of conscience (which will mean not only no more Inquisition, but also no more secular power out of the Church), and he'd like to keep the very ideas of God and religion from being smeared with the Reveal and all the crap heaped on it by the likes of Langhorne and Clyntahn.

The Church of Charis may still be an abomination, but it's taking steps in that direction: de-emphasizing the Writ elements that are nothing but fiction to serve Langhorne's program; casting the role of the Church as to teach and support rather than terrorize and compel; perhaps distancing the Church's "secular" functions (medicine, law, teaching, social welfare) from its theological ones; and setting up a certain distance (by Safehold standards!) between it and the government. Get that kind of approach accepted, and you're closer to getting Langhorne's model rejected.

Even the Temple Loyalists in Charis (and the whole Loyalist through Reformist spectrum short of the CoC elsewhere in the Empire) are now having to be loyal (if grudgingly) to a state that does not have the imprimatur of their Church, and to deny the Temple their service as fanatic assassins against the Empire. So they're getting used to that kind of familiar-to-us dual loyalty even without it being (yet) a part of their formal, acknowledged belief system.

So there's this sneaky, underhanded example brewing in Charis now for the rest of Safehold (oh please, Bloody Siddarmark, take note...) for mutual religious toleration across faiths under a single secular government. And in point of fact, no one in government is compelling anyone to choose between the CoC, some variety of Temple Loyalist church that can manage to live with it, some other variety of Reformist Church that can manage to live with it a bit more easily, or even (still essentially hypothetically, outside the Inner Circle) leaving theology behind and staying home on Wednesdays.

If and when people can wrap their heads around that, they can do without bloody religious wars. It takes less than the triumph of the Church of Charis - it just takes its triumph securing space to breathe in a given area.

JeffEngel wrote:

Peter2 wrote:*quote="Randomiser"*

That kind of anti-religious allegation is often bandied around these days. Then I think of Stalin, Hitler, Pol Pot and even Mao, the devastation they caused and the millions of deaths they were responsible for, and wonder which religious 'governments' were so overwhelmingly worse than them. Have you any suggestions? Or are you willing to apologise for that piece of anti-religious prejudice?*quote*

You either did not read what I wrote, or read things into it that are not there. I used the phrase "ultimate power" – please note the word ultimate. I neither said nor implied – and nor do I believe – that religions should be powerless. On the contrary, I consider most of them (certainly the ones I know well) to be considerable and significant forces for good. But I maintain, as I said, that "Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely," and when that absolute (i.e. "ultimate") power rests with people who feel justified in shifting responsibility for their actions on to the shoulders of their God(s), there is a greater probability for it to be exercised with less restraint. I stand by what I wrote.

For that matter, if you substitute things like "the General Will", "racial imperative", "the dialectic of history", or even "freedom and our way of life" for "God" in the same dynamic, you get the same results.

n7axw wrote:

JeffEngel wrote:For that matter, if you substitute things like "the General Will", "racial imperative", "the dialectic of history", or even "freedom and our way of life" for "God" in the same dynamic, you get the same results.

Bravo, Jeff, for that last sentence! The thing that I find hardest to teach is that our dynamic, the God and country dynamic, can be just as evil as any of the isms when it turns into an our bunch better than the rest mentality.

The only thing that can prevent that is a solid commitment to servanthood.

Don

chrisd wrote:

OrlandoNative wrote:The closest we allegedly might come to *anything* directly given from anyone/thing other than a "fallible human" might be the original tablets with the Ten Commandments, but as far as we know they haven't survived to this day; *if* they ever existed in the first place, which is something many of us take on faith.

God's final words to Moses on Mt. Sinai?

"Keep taking the tablets"

PeterZ wrote:

McGuiness wrote:snip

So there's this sneaky, underhanded example brewing in Charis now for the rest of Safehold (oh please, Bloody Siddarmark, take note...) for mutual religious toleration across faiths under a single secular government. And in point of fact, no one in government is compelling anyone to choose between the CoC, some variety of Temple Loyalist church that can manage to live with it, some other variety of Reformist Church that can manage to live with it a bit more easily, or even (still essentially hypothetically, outside the Inner Circle) leaving theology behind and staying home on Wednesdays.

If and when people can wrap their heads around that, they can do without bloody religious wars. It takes less than the triumph of the Church of Charis - it just takes its triumph securing space to breathe in a given area.

What I believe many people don't emphasize enough or forget, Mac, is that Safehold does not have a history of varied morality. Everyone on Safehold has the exact same base for their morality. There truly is only one right moral answer to any moral question. The basis for moral judgment is found in the Writ. Period.

In order for anyone to assert a moral judgment that is acceptable to Safehold in general, it must be founded in the Writ. That means morality and theology are one and the same until such time as the Reveal discredits the Writ.

Defeating the armies of the CoGA means absolutely nothing unless the CoC can find arguments within the Writ to change the CoGA's more objectionable doctrines....like the Inquisition as is currently authorized. Without such arguments not even an army sitting in Zion will make Safeholdians believe good might be defined by anything other than the Writ. Christians tossed to the lions in Rome just had their faith and God's love. Safeholdians have God's love, less well developed faith and documentary proof that what little faith they do have is well founded because God really does exist. Christians never gave up their religion. What makes anyone think that Safeholdians with apparently far more buttressing their religion give up on their? So long as they won't, toleration must be founding on the Writ somehow. No amount of guns can ever win that argument.

lyonheart wrote:Hi JeffEngel,

Kudos!

Thank you for making some truly excellent points!

Even the EoC TL's have to admit how much forbearance the crown has shown them, because Cayleb, Sharleyan and the inner circle truly believe in freedom of conscience, creating this new paradigm that will change Safehold forever once it is known for itself, since the war and the Go4 propaganda prevent their followers from understanding what the inner circle has done yet.

But it will take considerable time to seep through the consciousness of the the CoGA relic states, but as the example takes hold in Siddarmark, Silkiah [which might still be independent after the war] and probably Dohlar, that sense of freedom to think or not will be both envied and sought after by all those seeking to improve things for the better for their families and their future.

Establishing Charis as the recognised leader and role model on Safehold in social freedom will make an unsubtle boost to its already considerable influence.

This will create some conflict in Charis as those that seek reform, like the levelers, move to Charis to promote their preferred causes.

It will be interesting to see how Charis will change or accept such ideas, and how many of these reformers find they like Charis just the way it is.

L

n7axw wrote:Hi Lyonheart and PeterZ,

I guess I'd have to say that Lyonheart spaks very eloquently for me here.

However, I would understand Peter's concern about the post-war COGA. I would only say that I wonder if there will even be a Council of Vicars. They might be better off settling for Archbishops and below who live in their sees. Maybe have Zion as the gathering of an annual convocation and use it the rest of the year as a shrine.

The point is that it will have to be the COGA's surviving clergy who pick up the fragments of what is left after the Council of Vicars is gone. Nobody can make those choices or do it for them. Trying to impose something from without would only be counterproductive.

Don