Church of Sanoma

Life is meant to be enjoyed, or so teaches the church of Sanoma. His worshippers practice what they preach, and try to get others to do likewise.

Structure

As befits its founder, the church of Sanoma has no organized hierarchy. Each church is an organization unto itself, with its high priest answerable to no one save Sanoma.

Public Agenda

The church of Sanoma has no public goals except to brighten the day of the average person with various forms of entertainment.

Assets

As a patron of thieves the church of Sanoma has quite a lot of resources, as most thieves give and offering from their more successful heists.

Mythology & Lore

In the beginning was nothing, if we posit that nothing is neither light nor dark, sound nor silence, hot nor cold, etc. then when nothing fractured or shattered it released light and darkness, sound and silence, and so on. All mashed together into chaos. So, chaos is a raging storm of, well, chaos, constantly coalescing into . . . things and then dissolving again. Then after many eons chaos coalesced into two unique things, beings with sentience. These were Asmodeus, and Utu. Being intelligent and sentient these two beings remained as they were instead of dissolving back into primal chaos. Being intelligent, they began to shape the chaos around them. Eventually they encountered each other. It was hate at first sight. Their battle shook the primal chaos, and three new beings coalesced; Eresu, Meri, and Io. At first the balance remained as Io sided with Utu, and Meri sided with Asmodeus. Eresu initially stayed out of the conflict, preferring to quietly create, but eventually sided with Utu whom she found to be more to her liking as he preferred to create rather than destroy. Working together Utu, Io, and Eresu created the cosmos. Asmodeus sulking from his defeat created his own realm in mockery of the three. Meri attempted to reconcile with the three, hoping to have some say in their creation, in truth she wanted to corrupt what they created, and succeeded for a long time. Utu and Eresu have several children; first is Vaalea, followed by Mudutu, then the twins, Rohkea and Ukkonen and finally Sinnis. Asmodeus and Meri have three children Mursu, and Asbu, and Dayyanum. Vaalea and Mudutu marry and have two children Arammu, and Emku. Sinnis and Dayyanum have Kalbu, Laki, Mu, Osa, and Sanoma. Io and Eresu have a child Vuori. Io and Meri have a child as well, Azag. The three decided to create their crowning glory, Arda. Arda was by all accounts a paradise, an artistic creation of all the gods. Then Utu had one last idea, the mortal races. Beings to further shape the world. Utu wished to give the mortals free will, he was opposed by Asmodeus who wished them to be servants of the gods. The gods took sides and a great war erupted. Even the celestial servants of the gods took sides. In the end, Asmodeus nearly destroyed Utu. At the last second Io, who had been a voice against war intervened and took the blow meant for Utu. Io was destroyed and Asmodeus relented, accepting a compromise: the mortal races would be given free will, but Asmodeus would have leave to seduce any mortals he could to his service. From the corpse of Io two new gods arose, Bahamut, the platinum dragon, and Tiamat the chromatic dragon. Bahamut chose to side with Utu and the gods of good. While Tiamat joined with Asmodeus and the gods of evil.

Cosmological Views

In Arda the cosmos is divided into the inner planes and the outer planes. The inner planes consist of the prime material plane, which coexists with the First World and the Plane of Shadow. They are surrounded by the four elemental planes or air, earth, fire, and water, as well as the positive and negative material planes. All these planes “float” within the ethereal plane, the plane of ghosts and other incorporeal beings.

Surrounding and encompassing the inner planes is the astral plane which connects the inner planes with the outer planes. There are seventeen outer planes, nine each aligned with the cardinal alignments as well as eight that sit on the borders between alignments. Sixteen sit in a sort of metaphysical “ring” round the seventeenth. These planes are Mechanus the plane of Law, next is Arcadia, then Mount Celestia the plane of Law and Good, followed by Bytopia then Elysium the plane of Good, then comes The Beastlands and Olympus the plane of Good and Chaos after which is Ysgard then Limbo the plane of Chaos, after which comes Pandemonium then the bottomless Abyss plane of Evil and Chaos, followed by Carceri then Hades the plane of Evil, next is Gehenna followed by the Nine Hells plane of Evil and Law, then Acheron which brings things back to Mechanus. In the center of the ring lies the Outlands plane of Neutrality.

Tenets of Faith

Sanoma preaches that people should enjoy life even if it means bending the rules. Consequently, he has very few precepts for his followers and most are viewed more as guidelines than hard and fast rules. He wants his followers to follow his example. His worshipers tend to be a motley assortment of rogues, though services are frequented by the common folk.

Worship

Followers of Sanoma worship simply by enjoying life. Most set aside a little time each day to just stop and smell the roses, though the truly devout simply take their enjoyment wherever and whenever they can find it.

Priesthood

Clergy of Sanoma generally dress in grey or dark blue robes. Most dabble in theft as well as clerical matters, though what they acquire is redistributed to the poor and needy.