The Church of Traladara

This is just an overview of information presented in Karameikos, Kingdom of Adventure, Explorers Guilde (Boxed Set) and GAZ1: The Grand Duchy of Karameikos.

- Joaquin Menchaca
updated on July 26, 2002

Overview

The Church of Traladara worships three gods: Halav, Petra, and Zirchev, which are the historical heroes of Traldadara recounted in the Song of Halav, which is considered by the Church to be a factual recitation of the Traladaran history. The clerics provide advice to younger children, using the examples of behavior given in Song of Halav and the cleric's own personal experiences. The clerics advise the young, perform marriages, and officiate at other ceremonies, preach the church philosopiews, and promote goodwill. The clerics also fight in order to save lives or to defeat evils.

A cleric of the church can choose to worship all three Immortals: Halav, Petra, and Zirchev, and get domains: animal, law, healing, and protection. The cleric can also specialize and focus on one paticular god.

History/Religion

The Church of Traladra worships the three heroes in Traldaran history that now watch over the people: Halav, Petra, and Zirchev. The Song of Halav is considered to by a factual recitation of the history of Traladaran.

The practice of tea leaf, palm, and card readings, good-luck charms, evil eyes, and nonmagical amulets put the Church on a collision course with the Thyatian-dominated Church of Karameikos, and the relationships between the two faiths reamin stormy at best on this point of dogma.

The Church of Traladara has a following of roughly about 70% of the populaton, which is estimated to be over 250,000.

Dogma

The basic philosphy of the Church of Traladara dictates that people should not harm one another, and that when they do they should punish the wrongdoer in proportion to the degree of the evil action. The beliefs of the church include the following tenets:

1. That the acts of assault, abuse, murder, theft, and lying are sins, brought on by weakness or the intrusion of bad-will from evil or animal spirits
2. That the sins described above should be punished, in teh manner that parents punish children: physical punishment, imprisionment, and the withholding of rights (even death, in the case of extreme sinners who endanger others).
3. That the role of the individual in the afterlife will be determined by the individual's state of wisdom, strength of character, and good-will at the time of his death.
4. That the relationship of man to woman is a personal matter, not involving the philosphies of the Church unless one of the above sins is involved.
5. That common magic ritual such as use of lucky charms, tea-reading, palm-readings, card-readings, and so forth are all declarations of a man's curiosity about the world and determination to preserve himself from evil, and are often rewarded by the Immortals with the gleaning of facts about the future or nature of the world
6. That the events of "The Song of Halav" are absolutely true; that King Halav, Queen Petra, and Zirchev are now Immortals guiding the righteous and punishing the wicked in Taladara/Karameikos; and that the Gold Age of the Traladara will on day return to this land.