The majority of Cosmonists don’t identify with any sect or like, adjective on their belief system. Particular communities honor the deities and ideas from within the broad Cosmonist umbrella that are most relevant to them without the direction of any authority outside the very slight influence of their local shrines and priestesses. But the authorities of the holy city of Ovaiakon--where the writings of the Poets were first compiled--and later the Hyperians, have made several attempts to secure the loyalty of their subjects via regulation of the faith of their subjects, and many of these attempts have sparked organizations specifically established to counter them.
A few years ago when the SC universe was really new, I tried to do overview posts for all the different religions from different worlds but got bogged down in trying to even describe the diversity of interpretations of Cosmonism. I still want to describe all the different belief systems from around the galaxy because they’re all really interesting, but first I think I’m going to do a series on different major Cosmonist sects because that’s behind a lot of the cultural push and pull happening in the main setting.
So without further ado, the Licentiati!
This is a sect/set of beliefs within the Cosmonist umbrella based around the mainstream teachings of the Sitherian praeceptors, who traditionally have been considered the highest-ranking interpreters of religious law in Basilea. Maybe at one point you could say that the Licentiati (“sanctioned”--as in sanctioned by the throne) were the arbiters of “Official” Cosmonism, but that point was a very long time ago. It’s a religion that inherently doesn’t sit well with centralization; the Empress can puppeteer the praeceptors all she wants, but as long as local priestesses and the Holy Poems hold that one’s local cosmological forces have the final say, there are going to be those devout enough to listen to them first. That said, the Hyperians (and certain of the planetary High Queens before them) have Put The Work into cultivating a Basilean nationalistic sentiment, and there are certainly those who believe every word a praeceptor writes simply because she has the favor of Our Most Exalted Lady The Empress Matri Hyperiae.
The first praeceptors were trained by a priestess named Centora--so named because she was supposedly the hundredth descendant of the captain-queen who founded Ovaiakon, the “city of destiny” where the writings of the Holy Poets were first anthologized (the liturgical/ceremonial sections of which are thought to have been authored by Centora herself). Although they were trained by an actual priestess, praeceptors do not perform any ceremonies themselves--they’re purely teachers who train “sanctioned” staff for “sanctioned” shrines and temples. At the start there were six, now there are 216 (it’s traditional, though not required, to initiate them in classes of six. Early Cosmonists were big on sixes because the early Taregans were big on sixes. The early Taregans were big on sixes because they perceived the seasons of their world as occurring in multiples of six, although they’re not actually that tidy). Somewhere along the line the office of the Archpraeceptor was created as a liaison to the public and the royal family. Although it’s tempting to go lol lesbian space pope about that (I know I do!) it’s important to note that the Archpraeceptor isn’t actually above the others despite her title--she’s more like a very holy press secretary.
The thing that DOES make the Archpraeceptor special is that she carries requests from the Empress to the rest of the praeceptorate, and she’s responsible for conveying their collective decisions to the public, so one of her main qualifications is being a brilliant lecturer. Praeceptors are teachers, not authorities, in theory, but with her skills and intergalactic platform to bolster their agenda, they still hold a ton of moral influence.
Sanctioned holy maidens also include literators--resident scholars of the Poets who live and work at local temples and act as arbitrators in doctrinal disputes--and satellite priestesses of the imperial city’s Temple of the Excelsic Barycenter, who train with them directly and are expected to deviate little from their pet ideas (see below).
Some vestals are Licentiati and some aren’t. A majority of Orellistian and Levinoxian orders in the Seven Suns are/were sanctioned, but only a slight majority, and orders devoted to the minor goddesses are all over the place.
Even though they didn’t originate it, the Licentiati are the main dispensers of the idea that the forces of the universe dictate a rigid Order that’s best not fought against. Being that they get most of their perks from the Hyperians’ favor, they have a vested interest in positioning the hierarchy as inevitable.
On the other hand, the praeceptors have been around a lot longer than the empire has, and historically they’ve been a main source of the guiding relational quality of Basillan and Sitherian morality--loyalty is the highest virtue, your first duty is to take care of your own (or those directly above and below you), and the goddesses, as your most powerful benefactresses, are to be showered with reverent affection so that they know the love with which they provide for you is reciprocal.
The Licentiati have been responsible for laying the groundwork for the flipflop on Levinoxia that we see underway in the Vol. 2 flashbacks, framing chaos and the spiritual conception of the vacuum as potentially confusing influences to be avoided by all but the very advanced in religious study at first, and then as outright corrupting, a shift that occurred gradually within a few generations of teaching but went public almost overnight.
The praeceptors are obviously very into the calendars of ritual offices recorded in the Holy Poets, because *Bernie Sanders voice* they wrote the damn liturgy. They’re also the fondest of all the sects of portraying offerings and prayers to the goddesses as simply the highest tier of feudal tribute and homage, a stance a few controversial praeceptors have even taken as far as being opposed to mundane fealty (why give a cut to a Great Lady when you could give all to the Greatest Ladies?). These obviously didn’t last long because they had to fall in line with their own royal/imperial backers, but it was an interesting logical extreme, though sadly not as revolutionary as it sounds when coupled with the conservative ideas about the inherent fittedness of some folks to rule over others that they also tend to espouse.
