Technology In Fading Suns

The Privilege of Martyrs

A quandary arose. The Church still needed tech to maintain communication between worlds (in some areas they feared a justifiable return to rural paganism). The Church held that its own use of technology was a necessary evil, but the Doctrine of Universal Inheritance admonished Church orders not to become enraptured with technology (The love of matter (Amor Materia)) but to instead use technology as a tool "to aid and protect the faithful." While technology was not named an evil by the Doctrine of Universal Inheritance, the doctrine lead to a suspicion of technology which shaped all of the Church's later attitudes toward it. The later doctrine of the Privilege of Martyrs (4357 AD) gave the moral and theological reasons for the Church's continued use of technology (even, by extension, certain creature comforts which were denied the common man).

The Church came to be symbolized as the spiritually mature adult administering to the child, who represented the general masses of humanity. Archbishop Dmitri of Urth, and ally of Bishop Eren of Aragon, wrote to his congregation, "That we take on your sins, and guard over you, and take upon the role of guide in this world and the next is correct. We have become as dutiful ship captains answerable to our distant Master, steering the many through the storms of life. That we use starships and weapons to guard the unguarded is just, for the Church Universal takes on the task of humanity's responsibility, given lovingly to our burdened shoulders by the holy commands of the Prophet. It is our duty to guard against the demons of the dark and keep our flock spiritually reflective, away from the trying corruption of the technical." When Bishop Eren of Aragon died, Archbishop Dmitri combined both of their writings and produced the Doctrine of the Privilege of Martyrs:

"We, the holders of the truth which dies not, do affirm that the sacrifice of the few in the Universal Church for the many souls gathered in our care is a noble and selfless calling, that our use of technology has been granted to us by the Most Holy Prophet Zebulon in concrescence with the Pancreator, blessed be the name in worlds without end, as given to us in scripture, Galaxia 5:8 and Horace 16:12. That we, as masters temporal and spiritual in stewardship of the Pancreator as bestowed in blessed solitude by Zeublon the Prophet, having duties to defend those less spiritually called, are granted the use of technical tools of sentients, which are denied most, and that this is a just and blessed mystery, understood as our duty spiritual for the comfort of those in our care."

The Privilege of Martyrs thus had a spiritual sacrificial element in it. The Affliction Technologia is the term the Church gave for their exception in using technology, voluntarily engaging technology's spiritual dangers so that the masses would not have to partake of such sin.


Adapted from Forbidden Lore: Technology,
Copyright 1996 by Holistic Design, Inc.

Extreme Penance

The Church began proscribing technology soon after the Fall, and clashes with the guilds and nobles over the Orthodox interpretation of technology became inevitable. Armed conflicts occurred, skirmishes in the great debate. Some believe the Church could have won against both parties given time, but the nobles held the military might and the League, the machines. The threat of damnation and soul-death through excommunication held only so much sway. More than anything else, it was the Church-influenced peasant revolts that gave the institution its power. Finally, a resolution to this conflict was forged in the face of threats from barbarians who posed a danger to all.

The nobles were granted immunity from most tech proscription during the Barbarian Wars (4525-4550 AD), believed now to have been a concession by Patriarch Nadrim to Vladimir in return for military protection of Church Cathedrals, a frequent target of barbarian assault. The end result of this progression came in 4545, when the noble houses were placed in the role of "extreme penance," a symbolic state of repentance for their necessary technology use. Responsible to the Church for the safeguarding of all sentient souls (human and otherwise) placed under their protection, all the noble houses agreed with this viewpoint.

Nasim the Humanitarian, the famous historian, wrote: "The cynical saw the profits of both nobles and Church in this act: only a select hierarchy would be allowed to play with the damning fires of progress." The faithful rejoined that the organic order of society was preserved, and that devastating wars and horrors had been averted by the delivery of high technology into responsible hands.

The guilds were originally excluded from the Church's grace. However, a curious article, "Bonum Brethren," proclaimed that those who were independent of the Church and nobility yet who allowed the Church the use of their skills and specialized knowledge could receive spiritual instruction and grace. This was a nod to the power of the Merchant League, for the Church needed it for space travel and technological upkeep, although this was never officially admitted.

Later, after Vladimir I was assassinated and the Regency took his place (4550), Patriarch Nadrim proclaimed the guilds to be in extreme penance along with the nobility. He sanctioned their tech usage for political reasons, and later patriarchs believe this was a flimsy document by a weak patriarch, but the guilds cling to it for moral justification when the need arises. Still, by the letter of doctrine the nobles and the guilds are not fully immune from the Church's proscriptions on technology, for the Inquisition still has power over them. Yet the Church's need to court elector sceptors from the nobles and the League meant that post-Vladimir patriarchs used threats judiciously and politically, rather than theologically.


Adapted from Forbidden Lore: Technology,
Copyright 1996 by Holistic Design, Inc.

Other Factors of Importance

Star Travel