In today’s post, I’m going to go into more detail about the deity Deum Radiant and the Illuminate Society, one of the many sects within this deity’s faith. Both of these concepts were introduced in my recent post on Ipki Chainbreaker, goblin Inquisitor.
This content won’t be a part of the CRB when it releases, although there will be an extremely brief summary of Deum Radiant’s principles and creed. I’m reserving this more detailed content for a supplement focused on Divine characters, and the approach I’ll likely take is to cover the basics of a deity’s “generic” faith, symbol, and creed, and then discuss a handful of sects representing variations on the generic faith: one orthodox, one heterodox, and one heretical.
The Illuminate Society is a heterodox sect…
The Faith of Deum Radiant
Deum Radiant is a god of light, truth, and hope. Its followers include investigators, reformers, philanthropists, and the oppressed and downtrodden who hope for better days to come.
Symbol and Creed of the Faith of Deum Radiant
The symbol of Deum Radiant is a flaming torch or shining lantern. The most common creed adopted by anointed priests of Deum Radiant is “Spread hope. Uncover truth. Act righteously.” Variations on this creed include:
- Mortalkind cannot thrive in darkness, literal or metaphorical. Light brings hope and unveils the misdeeds of the wicked.
- Lies and secrecy seldom have any benefits; the truth shall set you free.
- Light is most needed in the darkness, where it shines brightest. It is the duty of the faithful to bring light into dark places.
The Illuminate Society
Many worshippers of Deum Radiant follow a personal faith, without a priesthood or formal temples. The Illuminate Society is a movement rather than a church, attracting driven individuals from the faith who have chosen to dedicate themselves to fighting injustice and suffering.
Members of the Society, more than any other sect of Deum Radiant, put their ideals into action: the Illuminates outright deny that the law can prevent them from doing what they believe is right. The Society plants itself in opposition to tyranny, injustice, and oppression, and it engages readily in direct action. Its adherents’ tactics start with nonviolent protest, but when that fails to inspire change, they escalate rapidly to incitement of riots and uprisings, attacks on corrupt politicians and judges, and outright insurrection against what they consider illegitimate authority. The Society’s less rebellious actions include advocating for the expansion of the right to vote in Waystone and the Novan Imperium, and working to stamp out the slave trade, which is already banned in Aetrimonde’s major polities but persists in some minor polities and lawless regions.
Many sects have been declared heretical for actions that were less inconvenient to secular authorities. The Illuminate Society is officially considered merely heterodox, for three reasons. Firstly, the Society’s direct actions are mostly against targets that Aetrimonde’s major polities consider acceptable, like despotic city-states in the Cession and sorcerous overlords hiding out in the Frigid Wastes (although the Society does regularly have “disagreements” with the Victovan and Sanctean governments). Secondly, the Society does not preach: it draws converts mainly from the faithful of other sects of Deum Radiant, and attracts them by, essentially, doing exactly what many worshippers of Deum Radiant wish they could. And finally, the orthodox sects of Deum Radiant defend it against every attempt to declare it heretical: while they might not outwardly support it, the uncomfortable truth is that the Society merely puts into practice the creed of Deum Radiant, without the reservations or compromises that orthodox sects have. To declare the Society heretical would go against their own faith…and would likely drive converts to the Society anyways.
Unlike many religious orders, the Illuminate Society does not give any special preference or privilege to empowered priests. Chapters of the Society are just as likely to be led by philanthropists or social workers as by clerics, and many of the Society’s direct actions against slavers and despots are executed by mundane soldiers with no divine magic. That said, the Society does attract many Crusaders, and a number of Inquisitors who, aside from holding their fellow Illuminates to necessarily strict ethical standards, also perform covert actions on behalf of the Society.
Symbol and Tenets of the Illuminate Society
The holy symbol specific to the Illuminate Society is a torch encircled by a band of darkness, with rays of light which pierce through the ring. Creeds of anointed priests among the Society often contain one of the following variations:
- Do what is right, without reservation or compromise.
- If the law forbids ethical action, then it has no just foundation and can rightly be ignored.
Up Next
As you can see, Ipki Chainbreaker, the liberator of slaves, is a perfectly typical member of the Illuminate Society…maybe even a little on the moderate side. I’ll be following this up with another post fleshing out the other part of Ipki’s background: the Unclaimed Reaches from whence she hails.
Aetrimonde 
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