thread: 2011-07-11 : Hooray for Religion
On 2011-09-18, Amphiprison wrote:
Maybe. Sometimes. See, Jacques isn't exactly consistent; that's part of why Christianity is so big on sin, repentance, confession, and absolution. From day to day, even hour to hour, depending on his circumstances and mood, Jacques' faith might be boltered or rocked by various events in his life. When a person who wasn't even Jewish kept faith in their God even when that God destroyed that person's family, livelihood, and physical health just to see what would happen, the Jews were so impressed they incorporated it into their religious texts. They even gave the guy a whole book! Big friggin deal even back then.
Sorry. Jacques. Maybe. Sometimes. Little things have an effect. Maybe Jacques curses God on his deathbed as he's dying of the plague and his grandkids are there to hear it. They're mortified, they never forget no matter how much their parents try to tell them old Papa Jacques was out of his mind with plague-fever. The parents assure the kids that he's in Heaven, that God was pretty OK with his last-minute blasphemy. Those kids grow up with this little niggling idea in the back of their head that God's kind of scabbing on his promises- the priest says only those who accept God will go to Heaven, but Papa Jacques suddenly rejected God before death and our parents assure us he's in Heaven- somebody's bullshitting us.
When they flee their hometown to Avignon and see how the Pope really lives, like a royal in his courts, and how they turn away the masses at the gates so His Holiness doesn't catch plague (I'm making history up a bit at this point, bear with me), maybe this tears it for one or more of the grandkids and they go all-out anti-Church during the French Revolution, setting cathedrals on fire and the whole nine yards.
These are just a few kids, sure. But if a religious institution alienates enough of its congregants and this story becomes common enough, you have the French Revolution, the Protestant Reformation, the Sufi movement in Islam, the Unitarians, and the like.
To bring it all back to roleplaying games: What *does* Jacques believe in his own head, and where does he draw the line? What kind of divine powers are out there, and how do they tell? Are they *really* omniscient/omnipotent? Gods in epic myth and modern fantasy just really don't seem to act that way- and if they're not, the God-person relationship becomes *much* more complicated and interesting.
That's where I like to poke about- as Jacques, wondering whether I'll be damned for this unfaithfulness, or this, or... this. There's just no real way for Jacques to know for sure. He still can't read the Bible cause he doesn't know Latin- that's only for (male) clergy these days. He only knows what the priests tell him about God's expectations.
You might say it doesn't matter. You might say that if Jacques practices his Christianity publicly, and even when he thinks he's not being watched, then he might as well believe it. You might be a determinist then, and that's a whole other can of worms. For the sake of having an interesting, complex story with potential drama and meaning, I prefer to play games where it counts to have faith, deep down inside. Where the truly faithful are going to walk across that raging river because they're willing to bet their lives that their god exists and will grant them the power to walk across the waves. What makes them do that? Damned if I know for sure.
