I understand the purpose of mutable Scripture, and in certain ways change is valuable. But it also means that in times of strife and turmoil, when it is impossible to determine what is right, Scripture itself is no more reliable than those who write it. One has to ask, “Is this God’s will, or is it the interpretation of God’s will by a flawed human? Or worse, an intentional powerplay by a deceiver?” And so the foundation of our faith becomes open to doubt, leaving us still with no way forward.
Have we been? The bodies of power in Amarr have turned inward on themselves, covering up each other’s sins and working to safeguard their own power. Garkeh Khanid, the traitor who refused to commit Shathol’Syn, stole a third of the navy and a 5th of its territory, declared man’s law above God’s, and violated Sacred Flesh, struck from the Book of Records, was pardoned and made an heir again with no punishment. Jamyl, who violated Shathol’Syn and Sacred Flesh, was made empress and a lie about her “miraculous return” pushed on the people of Amarr. Idonis Ardishapur, the Khanid lords at Kahah, and other lords, have massacred slaves, and others run disgusting breeding facilities or sell slaves to blooders or Sansha’s Nation, all in violation of Amash-Akura’s laws on the appropriate treatment of enemies. Blood Raiders performing their own sacrifices infest the 24th Imperial Crusade and, by evidence of the Red Chamberlain and a blooder being allowed to participate in the Succession Trials, the highest offices of Amarr itself. The Theology Council refuses to rule against betrayals of the faith because the cases are controversial, unless it fits the material needs of a new empress in which case it will rush the decision.
Meanwhile, slaves are kept in bonds for generations, for the crimes of people who died thousands of years ago. Punishment is meted out on those who committed no crime of their own, because they have no power to contest it, while those who do have power are given free reign to act as they please excepting when they offend someone with greater power than they. Our lords have made a mockery of the purpose of Blessed Servitude with this hypocrisy.
And those who recognize these improprieties? Instead of bringing it forward into the light of day, to make the issue public and known to all, scheme in the shadows, because they are afraid of what would happen to them if they spoke out. Of course, even when we have spoken out, whether in private channels or public ones, the concerns are swept under the rug and ignored. The Grand Inquisitor of the Ministry of Internal Order said he would do something about blooders in the militia when we reported slave sacrifices, and never did. When Catiz was called to end slave sell orders on the SCC markets because it violated the laws that declare only Holders have the right to own slaves and because those orders are used to facilitate blood sacrifices, she rejected it. When the Theology Council has been called to rule against slave abuse or TCMCs, they refuse. And when we called out the wrongness of a blooder being approved as a Champion-Candidate for the Succession Trials, it was defended, not just by the Khanid lord responsible for the decision (Lord Chakaid, of course), but by the Imperial coordinator of the trials, Cardinal Sourem Itharen.
We have not been tempering our worst impulses, we have been facilitating them.