The Path of the Sun is the state religion of Aztlan.
Temples[]
The Path of the Sun is a pantheistic religion, with many deities, most taken from the ancient myths and legends of the Aztecs. Usually a temple (teocalli) is dedicated to a specific deity. Priests (sacerdote) normally dedicate themselves to a specific deity too, though a minority of priests serve multiple deities (or more precisely different manifestations of that deity).[1]
Every city, town, or village has at least one teocalli and most of them have several. Tenochtitlan has 5 major temples and numerous smaller ones. Tiny temples are sometimes built at major crossroads. They are built in the Mesoamerican stepped-pyramid style, complete with a sanctuary (shelter or small room) at the top. In modern-day Aztlan, except for the smallest teocalli they are constructed like standard buildings, except for the most important which are faced with real stone.[2]
Clergy[]
In Aztlan, during the 2050s there were 120,000 priests in the Path of the Sun. It's a hierarchical and monolithic church that is pretty much structured like the Catholic Church. Which is headed by the High Priest of Quetzalcoatl, with the High Priest of Tlaloc and the High Priest of Huitzilopochti underneath him. The Vicar General is in charge of the administrative functions within the Path of the Sun.
Clergy are supported by government funds and you advance up the ranks by demonstrating that your efficiency (e.g filling the temple with worshipers, increasing donations to the temple, etc). Less than 20% of the clergy are magically active, which is still high for a church. It's suspected that within the clergy there is a shamanic initiatory group and a hermetic initiatory group. The four highest ranking individuals are all hermitic and rank mong the most powerful mystics in the world.[3]
Worship[]
When it comes to the people, approximately 40% regularly attend Path of the Sun rituals and another 28% irregularly attend said rituals. Sacrifice is mostly symbolic. With the most common type known as autosacrifice, in which followers of the Path of Sun prick or pierce themselves (usually an ear or finger) to draw blood which they usually drip into a piece of paper and burn it. Some do it every day, others when making a petition or only at religious festivals.
Officially human sacrifice is not practiced. The temples are used for the execution of traitors, which are carried out in public on top of a teocalli using an obsidian sword, which to outsiders looks like a human sacrifice. When assessed magically, there is a magical connection between the executioner and victim, which is to keep the target calm.[4]
Secrets[]
Secret mystical rituals are being conducted at those teocalli. When assessed via the astral plane, it's been described as attempting to look into a searchlight. There is so much magic that it hurts is how it's been described. The immortal elf (Harlequin) stated that the degree of power in some of those temples is phenomenal.[5]
It is rumored that inside the temples, the magical initiatory groups secretly perform (meta)human sacrifices. Though no hard data, trideo, or photographic evidence has come up yet, too many people have said that they have seen this happen to be disregarded.[6]
References[]
Index[]
- Aztlan, 84-90
- Corporate Guide
- Sixth World Almanac, 166, 168
- Sprawl Survival Guide, 54
- Storm Front
- War!