I wouldn't exactly say it is my "calling" yet...
@Safetydummy, as it doesn't quite pay the bills yet; BUT, it is indeed a passion of mine to write, create intriguing stories, characters and situations, weaving it in a nice little package that can cause people to identify with it or get them thinking about something.
Nail on the head about all that you said beyond that though, from the manner in which most "righteous" individuals behave, offering two sides... a side they show everyone versus the side of whom they really are, but put everyone on blast because they think they are better than everyone else...
...right up to the Council of Trent.
Don't get me wrong, even though I didn't complete my training to become a priest, I still DO believe in God... however, my 'walk with Him' is not a public one, a private one not for show, nor do I let it be influenced or directed by the words and the desires of man... and, whether I was right/wrong in the path that I choose will be determined when it comes my time to be 'judged'.
When it DOES come to that time, when I skid across the finish line and through the pearly gates, with my ass on fire and my hair standing up and me screaming: "Whew, what a RIDE!!" and I get taken to stand before Him... I will be alone... I won't have a pastor there, a pope, a bishop, minister or priest... just me.
And... when He asks me: "Why did you do such-and-such?"
I doubt seriously that He is going to take: "Well... because so-and-so told me, I was supposed to do it that way."
Putting your faith in man to tell you what God wants from YOU, to me, is asking for trouble.
Man is greedy, driven by their own passions and 99% out of the time out only for themselves... they (or at least some of them) may mean well, but they are prone to mistakes and will ALWAYS interpret something to fit their needs, passions, wants and desires... and quite fallible.
A book written by man (or men), during a great length of time and through a period when the world was a tumultuous mess of one conflict after another, after another and after another, as well as, transcribed and rewritten over and over again by men who had passions, intentions and motives of their own and believing that none of those fallible intentions never made it between the covers is foolhardy... at least to me.
I mean, we are talking about a book that has been used to start wars and conflicts, that was used to torture and lash people to be burned at the stake... a book of ideals, written or transcribed by man, that's message even conflicts with what is written in it so that it goes from "An eye for an eye" of revenge to "Love thy enemy as you love yourself" of forgiveness...
So either God is seriously Bi-Polar... going from a Vengeful and Wrathful God of fire and brimstone to a God of love, peace and forgiveness... or man greatly influenced that book to use it as a tool to justify their actions or try to bring about a change that they hoped to see from mankind.
And if the latter is true (which is most likely), then why couldn't it have been a published manifesto contrived by an alien race with the purpose of manipulating mankind into helping them to accomplish their own goals, while also allow man to use it for their own selfish desires?
Which, just by those very thoughts by me... would, by every definition make me (and any that agreed with them) the antichrist... so it was that thought and the basis for the creation of this story and game. :angel: