Orthodoxy
Gausim al-Marain
When one embarks on a life devoted of faith they are instantly ushered into a world of wonder. The divine sacrament and investiture by a Spoke itself into your daily life is by no means an easy charge. It a challenge laid before yourself in the pursuit of a Potter, Craftsman, Artisan, a Teacher reshaping the world around you. Where as the Layman awakens and considers his task and chores, his duties, his hopes, his aspirations - The nature of Clergy is to place those secondary.
Yet for all the difficulty it brings, the headache, the heartache, so too does it bring such a sense of purpose, of acceptance of a higher power, of moments of pure ecstasy. To watch a man you have come to know is struggling, make a revaluation of himself and his world, in pursuit of something more. To watch a woman you have seen time and again maligned by others slowly build the confidence to stand up for herself. It fills the urn of the heart.
Yet this is not merely at the barest level, so too at the highest. Entire peoples, entire cities, may be studied and recognized to follow these same recourse. As they begin to find themselves, their purpose, as they grow and spread their arms and greet the night in a new and pleasant breath of fresh air. So too, may it fill the urn of the heart.
At its fundamental core Orthodoxy is the skeletal structure of the craftsman trades. The practices undertaken, the passage of master to apprentice, the undertaking of lessons until you are ready, journeyman status to discover and grow your craft, before in your own right becoming a Master of your work.
- If you are seeking a wagon built, you would not trust your precious wife and your life's works of cargo to ride up a mountain in one designed by the unproven.
- If you are seeking a bed for your child, you would not trust your younglet on something constructed on the sly by a man who cared more for money than craft.
- If you are seeking an armor to protect you from harm, you would not enlist a man who does not know the proper means of curving a breastplate - lest upon first strike it would buckle and pierce your chest worse than the strike.
Why then, why would, why should, Faith be any differed?
Many turn up their nose and rankle at the notion of Orthodoxy. Not so different than the believe that Governance brings with it restriction. Yet the very nature of a skeletal structure is with firm foundation a greater notion of all may be founded.
- Would you trust a House designed by a architect who eschewed blueprint because they "Told him what to do"?
- If you are placed on trial for a crime you did not commit, would you entrust your Advocacy to a man who had never studied Ephia's Legal Code, or read of the Law Library in the halls of Jurisprudence?
- A man who has first undertaken the Craft of Alchemy, would you trust to operate laboratory in a public space, where the misapplication and ill measurement could lead to the harm of many?
And to this I say -
Orthodox practices. These things hold merit, they hold place in Society, and they bring with them assurances. The understanding that one you seek is true, practiced, and learned in their craft.
The Refugee Clergy of Ephia's Well, the Apprentice or Journeyman Ullema, while they may make headway. they are far from Orthodox.
They are still learning. They are still discovering. I beg you have patience with their practices, and encourage all to seek to better understand. That because for five, for ten years one has studied a life of Faith? They are not Masters of this craft. There is still refinement to come.
And it is the duty of The B'aarat to aid in that refinement, as Mother of All Creation. As Overgod of the Wheel.