Voting is open, going to post TheLaurent's plan and get ready for bed then.
[X] Plan--Through the Gates of Heaven: we shall that An Examiner Is Required: The beliefs of each Faith Order must be tested one by one, for it is only through knowledge that we can come to an understanding. Thus all Faith Orders must be tested and proven to be without heresy, or rather within the bounds of orthodoxy, a boundary which is admittedly porous rather than exact. The questions to ask then about each Order are as follows, five times five, and yet the rewards for passing all of these Gates is five-fold. To pass just a few may allow one to exist, in the sense that there are those who cannot be (easily) stamped out... but to pass all Five Gates is to be declared a Sanctified Order.
-[X] The First Gate, the Gate of Orthodoxy, is to be passed only by the Worthy
--[X] One, it is to be asked whether the Order worships the Five or a single aspect, and if there is a focus whether it falls into a Particularist Heresy. Such heresies are to be gently guided from.
--[X] Two, it is to be asked whether an Order aids in the development of faith. An Order certainly can exist and if it is not a heresy in a Particulist or Anti-Particularist sense then it cannot be entirely discounted... but an Order should be encouraging the Body of the Faith in its actions.
--[X] Three, one must consider whether the Order cares for the living and the dead. Martydom is true and good for a worthy cause, but the Body of the Faith is both Living and Dead, "Lost" and Truly Found, and so if the Body of the Faith is injured, if it is instead of a bonfire for those to shelter around a roaring fire that will burn itself out, what justice is there?
--[X] Four, it is to be asked whether its developments of the Faith are to be considered Just. Justice is a quality of faith which is only discovered and proved upon action.
--[X] Fifth, then, is the standard of Action. This is the standard by which one asks not merely if they are just, not merely if they develop the faith, not merely if they are beneficent, but if they develop. Just as we can ask about a bonfire, we must ask about a machine, for a Faith Order should be a machine for the propagation of virtue, should it not?
-[X] The Second Gate, the Gate of the Wise, is to be passed only by those who love Knowledge.
--[X] The first point of the Second Gate is a love of learning. Ignorance, divine or otherwise, has no place in our faith. Thus we must ask that all who are within the Order are educated as to the path ahead.
--[X] The second point, of this second gate, is that Wisdom is respected. Those who lead should be those acknowledged within an Order either for their wisdom, or the concern of the whole. A Faith Order which provides an excuse for the unjust hierarchies of nobility or birth is a Faith Order which does not respect Wisdom.
--[X] Thirdly, we speak of the Wise but we speak of a process. Humility is a virtue for those who lead, and as such the heads of Faith Orders must make clear their compliance to the Faith, swearing then that all authorities, religious or otherwise, that are just and right are to be respected.
--[X] Fourth, in Wisdom this means no rejection of divinely allowed knowledge. That is to say, that an anti-technology cult, or one that eschews weapons to charge at an enemy, is one that does not worship the Five but instead runs close to the Chaotic strands.
--[X] Fifth, this Wisdom cannot replace all other Wisdom. Those who learn and enter the Faith cannot be isolated from all other sources of knowledge. If they wish to learn things outside of a Faith Order, they must be allowed.
-[X] The Third Gate, the Gate of the People, is about the treatment of their followers.
--[X] First, that a Faith Order cannot and should not demand of its followers all their riches, or control of their lives beyond the degree to which they agree as part of a larger task, for it is easy to imagine a Faith Militant that exists purely for profit.
--[X] Second, that a Faith Order should allow those who wish to leave to leave, for their faith is not the whole of the Faith, and that the body and the cells are as one is true... but so is it that it is no heresy to reject one Faith Order but accept the Faith at large.
--[X] Third, that all reports of cruelty are to be investigated, all signs of corruption purged. We speak not of Chaos, for of course we would know that, but instead of the kinds of abuse the powerful can inflict on the weak, whether sexual, financial, physical or otherwise. An Order which covers for such crimes is an Order for which we have no use. The Virtue must exist for the great and the small.
--[X] Fourth, that no rituals exist which are entirely secret, that while there may be specific actions and ways of worship, that these cannot involve the sacrifice of life and blood, the sanctification of violence, the seeking of excess, the celebration of sickness or hopelessness, or in any particular a violation of the laws of the Five or Man.
--[X] Fifth, that any such Order provide the means by which one can grow. An Order should be bottom heavy, of course, for it is the Masses of the Faith that are a portion. But no hierarchy must be unclimbable, and to be without Hierarchy is quite Just but far from required.
-[X] The Fourth Gate, the Gate of the Kindred and the Foe, is about the treatment of those unalike.
--[X] First we repeat, as always, the admonition against exclusion, against having an order of Nobles, or an Order only of Men, or Women, or those who do not fit into these categories, or only that of the Humans, though we acknowledge that an Order ministering to the Poor will predominantly have the Poor, to the Workers in the Factories thus and so, but that these restrictions cannot be absolute.
--[X] Second, that the Order engages in no bigotry or action against Kin or Protectorates, except those 'against' them in the sense of seeking their salvation and enlightenment, as with the Yeeni's embrace of our faith.
--[X] Third, if an Order does manage to make all the 'saves' thus far, if it is on the battlefield this is not a justification for defeating the Rules and Laws of War.
--[X] Fourth, an Order must not on the other hand embrace the views and beliefs of one outside. It is all well to try to convert former or current Neon Principalities, or even in a hypothetical case where they allowed peaceable contact to proselytize even among the Eldar, but ultimately the Federation is the only polity thus far that respects and worships the Star Child as all should, and so disloyalty to the Faith and the People is not to be accepted.
--[X] Fifth, is the rule of Outsiders. Each Holy Order is to respect all others that have been deemed worthy and have passed all the Gates. Fighting among each other is quite forbidden.
-[X] The Fifth and Final Gate is the Gate of Action/Inaction, the Gate of the Philosopher and the Hero, the Gate Upon Which The Galaxy Must Be Founded.
--[X] First, those Orders which are inactive, in the purely physical sense, that is to say who retreat to a monastary or hermitage to pray, must not in doing so prey upon the people, demanding vast qualities of resources to support them in luxury: donations are all well and good, but we read in our Histories and Philosophies of Monastic Orders which forgot this and grew to be fat, luxurious landholders.
--[X] Second, those Orders which are active in the realms of politics cannot act in such a way as to try to fully place under their control any aspect of governance: we cannot recognize the absurd statement of past philosophers that the Temporal and the Spiritual can be disconnected, or Separated, such that the Church and the State are Unlike... but we understand and so must an Order the basic dangers by which 'capture' can corrupt both those captured and those capturing.
--[X] Thirdly, those Orders active among Civilians must remember always the Law, and remember always the Virtues of the People, and in doing so they must demonstrate their encouragement of these virtues, by which one is to say that we shall Know Them by their Good Works and their lack of stagnancy.
--[X] Fourth, those Orders active in Military situations must be part of the hierarchy, must follow all of the WEENIE guidelines, must wear helmets and act in a military fashion that coordinates with all relevant parties.
--[X] Fifth, an Order which changes its activity, that is to say which is a warlike Order that seeks to expand to help in times of Peace, must pass through the Gates once more, and take lesson and instruction from those more experienced.
-[X] All of this is to be needed before an Order is Sanctified, and Sanctification can come with support from the People, and with acknowledgement of their role, as well as a place within the theology for imagining that they are in one sense the embodiment of the Body of Faith, a Feature upon the Face of the Faith's Body, but one not immutable, for to pass the Gates once is not all that is needed, any more than the Emperor-and-Omnissiah demands you be good once and never again. The Rewards for passing the Gates are great, and many, and so the standards must be high to be Federally acknowledged, and thus to be remembered by all, able to declare a single day an official Holy Day for one's Order, able to request support from local governments with oversight from the Council for those actions which are just, such as the founding of a new military unit, a better charity, or other such action. These and many other things come.. but only if you pass through FIVE GATES.
