Sgrios Mass: The Reality of Nature

Are the splendors of nature reserved for the worshippers of Cail? Many crook an eyebrow when they find out that I am most inspired when I’m surrounded by nature; be it beneath the shade of a mighty oak, or standing with my feet in the gentle caress of a stream or lake. I love to lay in the grass and watch the clouds pass overhead, and, on the rare occasion I take leave of my post here in the temple, I am most often found hiking the wilds. So why is it that these gifts should be reserved for those who worship the son of Ceannlaidir?

Those of the Cail temple have elected themselves as the custodians of the natural world, yet their perception of what that constitutes is heavily skewed - a near fictional idealization of nature. A visit to the temple in Undine is a picturesque and tranquil retreat from the stress of the real world - but it is just that - an artificial mirage meant to evoke nature without confronting it. Plant life is tended to and nurtured; carefully curated to achieve a visual balance and elicit an emotional response of joy and wonder. Walls are erected to control the biting mosquitos or predatory wolves that prowl the countryside of northwest Temuair. The temple is indeed a paradise, but as far as the natural world goes, it is a sorry facsimile.

Nature is untamed and wild; it is dangerous, it is deadly and yet, it is a realm of wonder because it offers such perils at the same time that it extends the glory of the wonders and beauty it contains. For, while a rainbow - even in an enchanted world - is still a wondrous vision, one must also look below the canopy for a complete understanding. A waterfall is nature, an impossibly tall Sequoia is nature, a vast canyon carved over millennia by a slow and steady river is nature - but so, too, is it nature when the fox closes his teeth around the neck of the chicken. So, too, are the untamable fires that sweep through the dense underbrush of the woods. So, too, is the destructive force of an earthquake.

Worship of nature must include the carrion crow, it must include the venomous spider, it must include the droughts and the floods, it must include the doomed lost cub, the birds that fall from their nests or the elk beset by starving wolves. One cannot hold the rose as the vision of nature and ignore the thorns; much of the natural world is a treacherous and dark realm. Nature is a desperate and deadly place, and when I see idealists turn a blind eye to these tragedies, they are robbing themselves of a unique splendor. A sunrise only bears promise because a sunset comes to follow.

As Sgrians, nature is as much our realm to tend as it is for those who follow our enemy. When the fly struggles futilely against the web, when the fruit falls, uneaten, to the forest floor, when the jackal outpaces the rabbit, when a rogue wave capsizes a frigate - when nature shows its wrath, we see our doctrine reflected in the shimmering of the tide, in the mold, in the crimson of the spilled blood of the hunt. Sgrios exists in nature just as much as Cail does, and while we may not find association with the beauty of a budding flower or the pleasant sensation of a summer breeze, without His influence, none of this would mean anything; none of this could exist.

So go forth; feel the sand between your toes, walk among the woods, let the sun kiss your skin and be sure to inform any ignorant minds that we belong there, in nature, as much as the wolf, as much as the brook, as much as any Cailite with their fabricated beliefs.