The Eastern Patriarchy of The Mother

Divine Origins

Created after the exodus of Garrond Lesnik, Kaldari Founding Father and his followers to the [The Kaldari Highlands, the Eastern Patriarchy was established due to meet the human's needs for a central, organized religion in the midst of the wilderness they had begun to conquer. Created almost carbon-copy from the practices of Pantheon: Astorian Traditional at the time, the early priesthood (Patriarchs, as they were to be known), was nearly exclusively members of the clergy to the Astorian traditional at the time of the exodus. Not explicitly set up to counter the influence of Astoria, the early members of Lesnik family quickly saw the possibility of influencing the common people and the more devout nobility by exercising an increased amount of control over their new religious sect. As the centuries moved forward, the divergence between the two religions began to grow increasingly larger, until the guiding principles between the two were different enough to consider them separate religious expressions, as opposed to a regional variation on the Astorian principals.

Cosmological Views

The creation myth behind the Eastern Patriarchy matches the original teachings of Pantheon: Astorian Traditional and Pantheon: Western Reformist traditions, with only minor alterations that can be attributed to the natural evolution of storyline as opposed to directed alterations and challenges to religious doctrine. The Patriarchy teaches that The Goddess, or rather "The Mother" as she known to Patriarchs, created Alwaus, The Known World as a home for her Celestial children, before banishing them all together and separating the world between living beings and celestials with The Glass Veil. The Mother then created a series of different life-forms (Dragon, Faire'e, Alvain, Kinderstärke, etc) in an attempt to perfect her act of creation before ultimately creating Humans who serve as her most loving and obedient servants - and ultimately her "perfect" creations.

Tenets of Faith

While Pantheon: Astorian Traditional focuses on the depiction of The Goddess as a lover of beauty, the Eastern Patriarchy instead has a focus on The Mother as stern but fair guardian of the world, who values traits like hard-work, modesty, and honesty over the more Astorian principals of chivalry, beauty, and passion.

Ethics

With a focus on more traditional, grounded, and "useful" traits, the following tenants are seen as virtues for followers of the Eastern Patriarchy to demonstrate :

Calm
Courage
Diligence
Honesty
Humility
Patience
Temperance

Likewise, the following are considered either sinful or undesirable traits for followers of the faith to hold :

Contentment
Indiscriminate generosity
Undeserving compassion
Disorganization
Laziness
Promiscuity
Hedonism

It can sometimes be difficult to differentiate when the actual church finds to be unappealing behavior as opposed to the cultural views that the Kaldari hold in general to what they see as "alf-like" behavior.

Priesthood

The male priesthood of the Eastern Patriarchy enjoys preference in the religion, and are referred to as "Patriarchs". They are seen by those of the faith as the male expression of The Mother's grace in the material world. Women too can serve in the patriarchy, however, they are unable to obtain the title of "patriarch" without relinquishing their female identity and expressing themselves as men. The highest positions within The Eastern Patriarchy can only be held by men, however the sisterhood of the Eastern Patriarchy still serves an important and equal part in the administration of the church's dealings across Eastern Altwaus.

Granted Divine Powers

Like many followers of celestial beings, there are those among them have, or at least claim to have, powers to influence the magical nature of Altwaus through what is referred to as Divine Magic. Similiar, but different, to the powers demonstrated by Primal Magic and Arcane Magic, the divine magic of "miracles" that is displayed by the priesthood of the various Godess Pantheons is poorly understood and difficulty to both qualify and quantify. Some among the priesthood seem to have an abundance of control over their miraculous abilities, while others only display divine magic in a few instances in their entire lives. The vast majority of patriarchs never display any magical abilities whatsoever, but it is still unclear if the magical effects being produce by divine magic are in fact acts of direct intervention by The Mother or merely the typical applications of instictual primal magic being displayed and articulated through a religious lens.

Political Influence & Intrigue

Tied very closely to the nobility of Kaldari, the First Patriarch is subservient to only The High King of Kaldaria. The exact amount of influence the Patriarchy has over the King (and vice-versa) changes over the centuries, but in nearly all generations the two worked in a nearly symbiotic relationship with each other, with each strengthening the claims and power the other reached for. The patriarchy was instrumental in promoting the commonfolk's acceptance of Lesnik rule during Garrond Lesnik's conquering of what is now modern Kaldaria. Likewise, the political and military apparatus wielded by The High-King serves to protect the Patriarchy by influence and ultimately re-absorption by the older and much larger Pantheon: Astorian Traditional, especially in the early formative years of the religious organization.