The Assembly (pt. 2)

The Universal Assembly shares its teachings of enlightenment with other faiths – in fact, it grew out of a tradition of enlightenment which it, indeed, universalized – but the structures it developed are its own.

According to the Assembly, self-attempted enlightenment is possible, but highly unlikely, and wont to result in harm to self and others, while contained traditions such as the one which gave it birth fail to provide enlightenment to any but a small handful at a time. For all these reasons, it instead demands one to submit to a hierarchic collective which, if taken part in on a regular basis, can in due time deliver its lessons and practices to a largest possible number of people. In this way, it claims, everyone can take their first steps on the path at a safe pace, those ready for fuller devotion offered to join one of many monastic communities. Good relations with authorities allow for logistic support and fewer organizational troubles. This, as well, leads the Assembly to spread over the world, its missions and monasteries forming footholds after which the rest of the structure follows.

A painting of St. Francis Borgia, by Alonso Cano (1624). An amusing little detail about him is that he was a great-grandson of pope Alexander VI.

Although few attain such level, a top-rank practitioner of teachings of the Assembly is said to leverage their attunement to the inner workings of the cosmos to such extent that they free themselves from the limits imposed by reality, allowing them to levitate, appear in multiple places at the same time, and other impossible feats generally only claimed as possible by wizards and charlatans.

Levitation of Mariana de Jesús, by Víctor Mideros (ca. 1926). St. Mariana de Jesús de Paredes is a 17th Century Catholic saint from what is now Ecuador. I wanted the Assembly to be less about mace-wielding spellcasters and more like weird enlightened mystics with otherwordly powers. Generic role-playing Clerics never quite worked in this manner, for some reason.

Exactly how many are these few depends on who speaks, for ecclesiarchs of the Assembly have at times expressed contradictory opinions; the doctrine is supposed to make it available to all, yet many popular claims are dismissed as unsubstantiated follies of the simple minds, and even among their ranks many are themselves too pressed with administrative tasks to fully devote themselves to meditation. However, it is also said that even at low levels one can tap into these teachings to ease one’s mind and strengthen their resolve.

That said, there are many who contend the Assembly’s claims. Many simply doubt them, preferring free thought in search for truth to old mystic traditions, which they see hide-bound and backward, no longer suited to the new times and ideas. But even among those unwilling yet to outright dismiss the claimed enlightenment, traditions contesting the Assembly continuously arise. Of these, some merely build independent structures of their own, while others entirely do away with anything but intimately personal meditation. Beyond the sea, the Assembly maintains specialized investigators to limit the impact of these deviant teachings.

In the colonies, however, it is still spread too thinly, which only incites more of these dissidents to come.