video;

[hymnals]

Who: Adrasteius; perhaps you
Broadcast: Everyone
Action: SS Bishop
When: Now!

[He's in the kitchen, as per usual. Anyone wandering in will find him standing on a fruit crate, though that's (somewhat) obscured by the camera angle on screen. He's got his skinny arms on his hips, and he's significantly more awake and alert than his last broadcast.]

Lots happening, lots happening. I know we're all busy trying not to eat those gumballs or worrying about our always ephemeral and doomed to fail stores of ill-gotten money, but I'd like to talk about something for a while.

[He gestures energetically, his hands sweeping outward from his body, indicating the entirety of space around him.]

The Light teaches us that we are all one with the universe. The first step towards a useful life is acknowledging and accepting this fact. You are part of creation, and creation is part of you. But that's not the end of it. Followers of the Light practice three core virtues: they are both principle and lesson at once.

[More dramatic hand gestures.]

One of these is tenacity. Tenacity doesn't just mean perseverance. No! Tenacity means understanding the fullness of time. It means understanding that the most rewarding path is the long path. That serving the universe, that fulfilling your ideals: these things require the dedication of years, not weeks. Not even months. Despair and hopelessness lie in wait for us at all times. Think of your lives here, and your lives back home.

[Adra points at whomever might be listening to this screed.]

Have you ever felt lost? Have you ever wanted to give up? Have the things you worked for seemed far from your grasp, or--worse--has it seemed like they've slipped away from you entirely? Such pain is the unfortunate reality of life. But you cannot, you must not, be crushed by these obstacles.

Many young students of the Light falter during the early days of their training. Here is the truth of it: we are all but one person. One soul. It seems impossible that we can affect change on any real level. Sometimes it may seem impossible for us even to survive long enough to think about affecting change.

But we can. You can. You are connected to the world around you, and even the small things you do--the meal you cook! the advice you offer! the hand you hold!--they matter. They bring change, even if it's not dramatic, or immediate.

You just have to stay in the fight.

[He steps down off of the fruit crate.]

Light be with you.

Comments

[child_of_bhaal]

[He's very involved in his spirituality, and she doesn't fault him for that, even though she...rampantly disbelieves anything he says actually applies to her.Sorry Adra. It could certainly apply to anyone else in the Fleet, or the Universe. Well not anyone else; her siblings would also be exceptions, but that's only twenty some people out of infinite amounts, right?

But she doesn't argue, because when she argues this kind of philosophy with Adra, she inevitably missteps and ends up apologizing to him and feeling like a misbehaving child. So instead:]

What are the other two?

[hymnals]

There's usually an order to how these things are done, but.

[He shrugs. They aren't in Azeroth, anyway.]

Respect, first. Compassion last.

[child_of_bhaal]

Compassion last?

[hymnals]

[Gently teasing.]

Did I stutter?

[child_of_bhaal]

[:P ]

Why? If there's compassion at all, why isn't it first?

[hymnals]

As I said, our virtues are principles and lessons. You're thinking too literally. Its place in the curriculum doesn't mean you should wait until we discuss the idea to practice it. In fact, students of the universe should practice all three virtues all the time.

[child_of_bhaal]

I'm only coming from my world's ways of practicing. Tenents of faith are often held in specific order of importance by different gods on Toril.

[hymnals]

[Adra's made his contempt for other religions well known, so he won't rehash it again. Instead, he just goes on patiently.]

This is not about importance, but difficulty. Compassion is more complex than it appears.

[child_of_bhaal]

[She's kind of the product of another religion so maybe it's best that they do not revisit his opinion there.]

I am very aware of that. I'm just trying to understand how your religion does things.

[hymnals]

Transparently and sensibly. In good faith.

And are you? Tell me, then.

[child_of_bhaal]

It would iterate you if I asked you to define what you think of as "in good faith, wouldn't it.

[It's not really a question. So instead she'll try to answer his. She bites her lower lip, thinking.]

When compassion is most needed, it's likely the most difficult to give. It's giving coin to a beggar when you're saving every copper for an emergency. It's protecting someone whom society would harm, for no other crime than being born an undesirable race, even if you're scorned for it. It's forgiving someone who betrayed you in the worst possible way.

Compassion is difficult.

[hymnals]

It would not. I'm using the phrase in its simplest form. Meaning, 'honestly'.

[He considers her answer.]

That's part of it. But the difficulty doesn't merely lie in the sticky logistics of altruism. It's about what compassion truly is.

Is it compassionate to feed a man, or teach him to fish?

Is it compassionate to let someone do as they will with you, because without you they may crumble?

Is it compassionate to let an empire fall in order to save the life of one person? Or is it compassionate to let that person die so that others may live?

Sometimes compassion can translate to suffocation. Sometimes it can translate to self-annihilation. Wisdom comes from knowing the difference.

[child_of_bhaal]

[These are good points, though debates sit on her tongue, unspoken. But her face is expressive as ever, showing the tone of her thoughts of not the details.

What if you don't know how to fish yourself? What if the empire should fall, if it harms an innocent? What if letting yourself be used, suffocated, annihilated by others is the only way to atone for the sin of your existence? What if. What if. What if...]

Do you have that wisdom, or are you still learning too?

[A quiet, sincere question. It's safer than any other running through her brain just now.]

[hymnals]

Such wisdom is the knowledge of countless lifetimes. I'm still just on the one.

[child_of_bhaal]

Do you get more than one?

[hymnals]

Who can say? I'll have to die and report back.

[child_of_bhaal]

I think that can wait.

video

[mistyday]

[Misty listens to this strange man with all her attention, drawn by the familiarity of a sermon, remaining for the message: it's one that's appealing to her, even if she doesn't know exactly what a "student of the light" is. Maybe he means white magic.]

Hey, now, that was pretty good! You a preacher man or something?

[hymnals]

[He's sitting down now, but his back is rod straight, and his long ears are at attention. He fairly hums with energy.]

I was, back home. Not many listeners these days.

[mistyday]

[She leans forward.]

I'll listen!

[hymnals]

That's good of you. I've about poured my heart out for one afternoon, though.

[mistyday]

[All eagerness.] Maybe another day then?

[hymnals]

Unless you have something you'd like to talk about now. For instance--your obvious enthusiasm.

[mistyday]

I've just had a lot of cause recently to be thinking 'bout that - religion and spirituality. Have you met Stefan? Me and him been talkin' a lot.

[hymnals]

Can't say that I have. What are your thoughts?

[He sounds a little cautious -- most people here have been vehemently anti-religion of any kind.]

[mistyday]

[Well aren't you in luck today Adra! Misty may be wary of organized religion right now - and for good reason - but she still believes, most ardently.]

Well, I believe God - or I guess what you're calling the Light, least that's what it sounds like to me - here for a reason. I just gotta figure out exactly what that reason is.

[Besides, you know, getting her out of Hell.]

[hymnals]

I am most definitely not calling the Light a god. Capital or no capital.

[mistyday]

[She blinks, surprised.]

What is it then?

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[droprate]

Is this a weird cult thing?

[hymnals]

Cults typically demand a bit more than 'try not to be a jackass', so, no.

[droprate]

So what would you call it?

[hymnals]

Aside from 'literally anything but that'? A guideline.

[lord_wizard]

Is this a lecture or a sermon?

[Now, despite his response, there's something in those words that resonates. He's been lost a long time; trying to do what little good he could manage, when his instincts that demanded the opposite often pulled him in the other direction. It seemed like bailing a sinking boat with a teacup, some days. At what point did it really start to make a difference?]

[hymnals]

A little of column A, a little of column B.

[lord_wizard]

People usually go the priest for that sort of thing, not the opposite. [Though, he's clearly not really mad about it]

[hymnals]

They're in luck, aren't they? I'm glad to provide.

[lord_wizard]

[He smirks, but the expression drops a second later, into a thoughtful frown]

You really believe that people are capable of change?

[ video ]

[beardstrokes]

[ For a minute, Obi-Wan realizes it's not him delivering the speech. ]

That was quite lovely, thank you. You don't hear such things very often.

[hymnals]

[Well, it's nice to be taken in good faith once in a while.]

All the more reason for me to keep shouting into the abyss, I suppose.

[beardstrokes]

I would not call this the abyss. Simply the place with some nonbelievers.

[hymnals]

There's belief and then there's deliberately choosing to ignore what's directly in front of you.

There's belief, and then there's dismissing an entire moral philosophy just because it might include a little bit of ritual and tradition.

There's belief, and then there's willful ignorance.

[beardstrokes]

[ He raises a brow to that. ]

That seems a little drastic. Belief can take many forms after all. I know a lot of people do not agree or appreciate the ways of the Jedi, but that does not mean they profess ignorance.

[hymnals]

I don't mean belief in the Light or not, though not to believe in it is like saying you don't think your socks are real--but--whatever.

I mean these people hear anything that smacks faintly of religion and they're out the door before we get to what it all really means. Which is to say: values. Behavior. A moral code.

I assume you're referencing something similar with 'Jedi', yes?

[beardstrokes]

Well . . . yes.

Faith is difficult for those who have had to abandon it to survive. I can't begrudge them their cynicism. I'm simply glad they're alive to choose for themselves.

[ Seriously, not being dead is a plus. ]