Okay. The two are actually a little linked.
So, first, I don’t think the Amarr will knowingly abandon their mandate while remaining as they presently are. However, by approaching things peacefully, they become merchants in a crowded market, one where they’re not limited to sectarian competitors. Sure, they’ve got a lot of drive and a deep pool of resources to draw on, but cornering the market on belief, or coming close to doing so, is far from a foregone conclusion. And certain players, notably Federal culture, can be depended on to push back hard in their own distinctive ways. At the same time, certain pre-cornered markets-- I’m thinking here of the State-- will remain largely or completely closed to them.
Some Amarr seem to assume that this will all go really smoothly and their faith will be a majority in the Federation and Republic within a few generations, but that’s pretty optimistic. In practice it probably will be a slog lasting many Amarrian lifetimes, with progress sometimes being made and sometimes lost. As a thought, it might go fastest when people push back violently against peaceful measures; martyrdom can be thought of as a religion’s opportunity to look its best. But, also, in order to compete in all the different places it’s going to be, it’s going to be adjusting to a lot of different circumstances. Further, it’ll be developing at least a small following in a whole lot of communities, and picking up a lot from them in turn. It won’t remain unchanged and unchanging. Actually it’ll have interesting new influences coming in all the time, even if its total number of followers is holding steady or probably even in decline; the faces won’t always be the same ones.
I don’t think the end of this is foreseeable, because I don’t think it exists in the foreseeable future. They’ve really got their work cut out for them, and the work itself will change them in ways we can’t really predict. Will they give up? Likely no. Will their mission still look very much in the end like it does now? Haha-- ah, I hope I live so long as to see what it becomes, but I really doubt I will.
In the meantime, I don’t see the functional strategic stalemate shifting all that much, and the more the culture puts into a peaceful approach the less ready they’ll be to pursue a forceful one. Of course, that can always change, but … if violence and vengeance are sort of cyclical-- violence breeding more violence-- hopefully peace can create its own self-reinforcing cycles. Even really bitter vendettas can be set aside, and historically often have been; how else did we create the mega-states of today, with populations way up in the trillions?
The future’s more hopeful, to my eye, than you seem to want to make it, Arrendis. The Amarr are very patient; it’s a virtue of theirs. But I think the future down that path is more interesting than they, or anyone, can anticipate with any certainty. And I think their plans are going to lead to very surprising places!
With luck, they won’t be disappointed to find themselves there. And hopefully, neither will you.
Edit:
PS: I’m already an abolitionist, not that there’s a major reason for the Amarr in general to take my opinion very seriously. But you knew that, true?