How to turn the Christianity into a practically polytheistic

>>51756155
Denominations. Make some up if you don't have enough to begin with.

>>51756155
Saints

>>51756155
Make the reverence of Saints on a whole new level.
So following different Saints can give you whole new branches of the church. Make orders have more meaning, so your Fransciscan monks can have stuff all of their own.

>>51756155
Christianity doesn't mesh with other religions. It's either a setting with more than one god or a setting with YHWE.

>>51756155

Look into catholism

>>51756155
Faith in the infinite power and love of the Lord Christ is sufficient for any God-fearing christian. Deus Vult.

Saints and denominations can work so long as you respect the commandments, though.

Worship the apocryphal archangels. Raphael, Michael, Gabriel, and throw in some others. Sanduriel, Eezequeel, etc. Each has a domain.

Make Christianity a Faith that 'gods' themselves hold.

Each Angel or ascended saint is part of a Pantheon with their own purview and powers, but have them all profess faith in a higher being- One which does not show any sign of existing, requiring true faith to invest your belief in. I think that could be an interesting twist on the classic Pantheon concept that would be very fitting of Christianity.

>>51756155
Polytheistic?
>Pagan.
>Christian.
Ever heard of the original voodoo?

I already feel disgusted for mentioning it but...
You know...
The thread demands.

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>>51756155
As has been said, Saints and Denominations. You know how many fucking denominations of Christianity there are? You know how many wars they've had with each other over it?

Have this handy chart. This is only the "major" branches. It goes on into dozens.

>>51756182
>>51756187
Putting an emphasis on Saint worship is probably the best way to go

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>>51756465
PS: This isn't including various Christian 'Heresies" of which there are a shitload (including protestantism)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Christian_heresies

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>>51756494
of course if denomination divisions are too... divisive... have some fucking saints of which there are literally hundreds

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>>51756535
Don't like saints? Kick it old school, and use THE MOTHERFUCKING APOSTLES, and say that in your mythos where magic and shit were really real, each of them represented a sort of strand or message of christianity (plus powers) that reso

>>51756155
Saints and Angels, bruh. There have been angelic cults and Saint reverence sects for millenia.

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>>51756545

>>51756545
It would be cool if their manners of deaths each gave you unique powers.

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>>51756607
Well, you would want ideally to do more research into each apostle and decide, based on their life and teachings, what bonuses they offer

but there's 13 of the fuckers (14 counting Judas) so..

PS: you totally need to add a secret Judas organization

ISCARIOT DOES NOT SHIRK WHEN THE ENEMY PRESENTS ITSELF

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Here's a non-conclusive (because there are over 800) list of Saints and their Patronage

Let players pick 1 or 2 like cleric domains

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>>51756674
cont

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>>51756693

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>>51756708
Good luck op, and happy 'vult
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Aw2GiQ8vsrs

>>51756155
You mean other than taking the Catholic route and having there be an army of saints and angels whom mortals devote most of their actual prayers to in order to gain specific blessings and boons? With Jesus and Mary just under the Trinity on the celestial hierarchy and each member of the Trinity handling specific powers?

Really, Catholicism is henotheism (polytheism but one god is considered the only god to formally worship and devote one's self to) lying to itself and claiming to be monotheism.

Just take a look at almost real world Catholic faith. Particularly in South and Central America.

>>51756155
>I want to give Christian players just as much freedom as pagan players.
What?

>>51756155
Saints? If you look at voodoo roots the reason they have so much stuff based on the saints is because slaves on the island plantations would find a saint with similar iconic traits to one of their gods from some random west african religion and worship that in their place.

Catholicism itself even has so much focus on the saints that people pray to individual ones. Hail Mary is a prayer to Jesus' mother. You don't even have to find a way to turn it into one, you just need to focus on the parts that are already there.

>>51756155
Saints,
Different order : fra,csicans, jesuits, jansenists...
with different aspects prioritized.
Or even different Cristianism but who stay together rather than fighting.
Exemple Orthodox isn't Catholic and isn't protestants.
Orthodox put Jesus as God first (Pancreator) while Catholics put his human side first (without being aryan)

>>51756898
>catholicism
>Jesus under the trinity

Already works as one, the holy Trinity can easily be turned into 3 diferents school of thought, also saints, apóstols, angels, the virgin mary, you have a lot where to choose, for a "monoteistic" religion It sure have a lot of "deities"

>>51756674
>>51756693
>>51756708
Wow, cool. Not OP, but Thanks anon.

>>51756155
Don't try to make Christianity the "same" as paganism.
Make new systems for Christians that give more freedom, like following certain saints as >>51756182 and >>51756187 said. Christian characters pick a patron saint, and that determines what they do/how they act/e tc

>>51756190
Christianity has been divided up into sects and cults from the beginning.

They might be nominally worshipping the same god, and their quibbles might have been over seemingly minor interpretations of scripture, but that was apparently enough to cause very different world views and trigger massive, bloody schisms.

>>51756155
>I want to give Christian players just as much freedom as pagan players.
>Medieval Europe
This makes no sense. The vast majority of nobility would be Christian, the majority of city folk would be Christian, with barbarians and farmers being mostly Pagan. Hell, just have your Christian players call crusades on the Pagans and kill anyone who doesn't convert, and they'll be happy. Better yet, have some of the Christian characters be from heretical branches so their characters can have crusades called on them.

>>51756155
Just have the archangels get some role. Many pantheons have a top god anyway.

>>51758053
>farmers being mostly Pagan
That's a big area and a long time to say that even true most of the time with any confidence.

>>51756155
Make the Trinity more literal, adjacency them be Three distinct entities, rather than just one with three faces. That way you can get an Almsivi deal going

>>51758240
You've got a point, but I still don't understand why OP made this thread. The Christian god is suppose to be all powerful and would have any power that the multiple Pagan gods would have. Why would OP want Christianity to be polytheistic like the Pagans? It doesn't make any sense to me. Also, the only way you're going to get the Pagan and Christian characters to work together is if you made something so horrible that they need to work together (similar to Poland and Lithuania working together the against Teutonic Knights). Personally, the Pagan characters would have to act Christian or they're going to be forced to convert or die, because I don't see a group of Christian knights and priests being nice to Pagans.

>>51756182
>>51756187
This. Just jack up the saint veneration to crazy levels

In the same way that Christianity took on holidays and traditions of other faiths, have it take on those gods as well.

BUT, importantly, they are all lesser gods, only about on the level of angels maybe. You can have no other gods before God, so as long as you live to God's code and show him primary belief and support, then you can do some pagan practices and afford a little worship to say, Apollo for example.

Basically God sits up on high, and the other gods mingle around by the foot of his throne. As a god of mercy, he didn't just destroy them.

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>>51758359
>As a god of mercy, he didn't just destroy them.
This is the funniest thing I've seen on 4chan today. Thank you good sir, have a (You).

>>51758359
I mean, didn't a lot of pagan gods end up being canonized as Saints anyway?

>>51758379
New Testament God, when he's all about the love.

So like in an area where they like Freya maybe, you've got the Christian cathedral, and within it to the side is a little shrine to Freya, or maybe one in the garden outside.

>>51758409
In this case though they are still distinctly "gods", they're just not the supreme being.

>>51758409
Some. The vast majority were called demons or any followers were killed for being "heretics" that consorted with Satan/Lucifer/Whatever they wanted to call the "Devil" at the time.

>>51758409
They usually ended up as demons. The saints merely took over the holidays, because people didn't really give a fuck in whose name they were boozing their heads off, but try to stop them from the boozing and you'll get pitchfork stuck up where naught but the light of salvation shines.

>>51756155
Pagan deities are Gods rebellious kids. With the pagan gods being real it would be quick to get the 3 miracles required for sainthood.

>>51757635
>Don't try to make Christianity the "same" as paganism.
We don't. It did that on its own.

>>51756898
Read 'The Germanization of Medieval Christianity'

I'd suggest this to the OP too

Basically, the Protestant charge of Catholic Trinity and Saint worship as being Pagan has a lot to do with the Church making concessions to the German pagans that converted to it en masse in large waves.

The strange Santa Meurte stuff in South America is an unofficial version of this, basically the natives worshiping left-over Aztec voodoo in the form of the Grim Reaper as a Saint of Death.

>>51759804
Saint and Trinity worship also has a lot to do with adapting Mediterranean folkways as well

>>51756155
There are plenty of people who view current Christianity as polytheistic

The concept of the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost is something you can work off of easily, making three big Gods with Saints and holy figures as minor deities or demi-gods

>>51759985
And let's not forget all those angels and Mary. There's even forgotten gods in the Grigori and nephilim and forbidden gods in the fallen angels, demons and devils. OP can even keep the whole No-other-God-but-me thing by re-fluffing it as being a very jealous pantheon. You'd have your over-deities with the warlike yet protective Father, the kind-hearted Son and the enlightening, inspiring Holy-Spirit.

>>51760934
Old Hebraic interpretation of the commandments was actually that. "Have no other god before me" didn't mean YHVH is the only god, but that he is the supreme god, and ought be revered foremost by his chosen people.

>>51756155
Literally the Seven from ASOIAF

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>>51756155
Like people have said, the saints are a good idea.
However i would like to ad different ideologys Like say, protestant, cahtolic, and orthodox.

>>51756545
Apostles are alreay saints

>>51758458
>>51758498

Nah, turning them into saints is way more common than demonizing them. It's just that the demon gets to keep the name, the santified god gets renamed to fit the christian lore but keeps the main traits. Like the andine god Tunupa who was (is) identified with several saints including Santiago, Saint Bartholomew and Saint Thomas but basically is still the same with some token atributes of the saint.

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>>51759862
This. Egyptians were doing pic related with different figures and costumes thousands of years BC.

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Fucking every European fantasy story has Christianity with the serial # filed off, but inexplicably a pantheon of pagan deities to worship

You aren't breaking any ground here

>>51760989
Yeah, but now it's more like, have no other god but us(Trinity) and these ones (Mary, angels, saints)

>>51761066
Why are Christcucks so pathetic?

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>>51756898
Nigga Jesus is part of the trinity
Who the fuck do you think the "son" is?

>>51756155
Syncretism. Have it merge with local cults.
Something that can easily happen if there is no centralized organization.

So you can have for example zalmoxian-christians who think that christ is the second big prophet after Zalmoxis and a mithrandatic-christian who thinks that christ is totally Mithra reborn. But beware of the Solar-christians, total cunts. they think christ was Sol Invictus walking the earth.
They are all wrong obviously, according the platonic teachings of Antiochos of tyre christ was obviously an enlightend being the shield us from the demiruge. Well unless you happen to be platonic-muslim in that case you think that Christ was imperfect and Mohammed did a better job.
You're discussing that still.

Don't get me started on those wonky Mazdean-christians...

>>51756545
>Only one of them died a natural death

>>51756187
I like the idea of saints. Adds flavor without adding polytheism.

>>51762545
>Don't get me started on those wonky Mazdean-christians...
You want wonky? One of Mexico's non-canonical saints (Jesus Malverde) is a drugrunner. Unsurprisingly he's the patron saint of drugrunners.

>>51762545
>mazdean christians

Isn't that just Manicheism?

>>51756155
Have the various different cults and denominations have a different 'understanding' of the One True God and that their power of worship cause multiple Abrahamic Gods to appear in relation to whatever culture spawned by them. Like Allah, Yahweh, Jehovah or the King of Kings or whatever you make up.

>>51761508
It would make more sense if the rest of the divinities gets the right to be called god negated by the actual God being an uncomparable superior being. Like with Ahura Mazda and the yazatas. Or Eru and the gods of Tolkien.

>>51762605
I just took some religions from the Crusader Kings 2 mod "Lux invicta".

>You want wonky? One of Mexico's non-canonical saints (Jesus Malverde) is a drugrunner. Unsurprisingly he's the patron saint of drugrunners.
Works for them. Most of the "warrior saints" were gods of war before, so why not a saint of drug runners.

>>51762304
A hill ornament.

>>51762648
Depends whom you ask. Manichaeism is more into the light vs dark thing. Christianity in the west was quite influenced by it.

What I wanted to show is that the imgae of christ somehow merged with the existing stuff. A zalmoxian-christ would maybe believe that christ came to tell his people that they were doing a good job and should keep the messengers (human sacrifices) coming. Thanking his believers for the steady flow of informations.

According a platonic-christ he was a paragon of reason, banishing the darkness of ignorance. Founding a shitload of schools.

Maybe some Frankish lord would found a branch around the sang real which would make him a descedant of christ, thus partly god.

Sycretism is fun as fuck.

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>>51762770
>Maybe some Frankish lord would found a branch around the sang real which would make him a descedant of christ, thus partly god.
>Frankish
Nah.

>>51762685
It would actually be detrimental to *not* call the minor deities angels and saints in my opinion. Worshipers of different pantheons would simply see it as a quirk of those kooky Abrahamists/Christians and simply inform others that 'saint' and 'angel' simply translates as 'minor deity', which they are but with specific names and titles. Also, instead of 'God', there'd be the Father, the Son and the Holy-Spirit. Three overdeities, countless minor-gods and demi-gods with people saying 'Father bless you' or '[insert Saint/angel] bless you' instead of 'God bless you', etc.

>>51760989
That is because what they call God now is just the only member of his pantheon to survive.

>>51756155
I mean, people have already brought up saint worship, but God is already three in Christianity, and several interpretations of Christianity (Arianism being the most notable) have interpreted them as separate beings.

Have God not be Jesus who isn't the Holy Ghost.

>>51756155
>Worship God, his prophets, the saints, and some of the old biblical heroes (Samson and the like)
>Believe all other gods are real, but are the wrong ones to worship
He says not to worship other gods-- He doesn't say they're nonexistent

>>51756535
>literally hundreds
There are almost 11 thousand canonized saints.

>>51756545
>no one has Judas' corpse

>>51756155

If you want to hew very close to normal Catholicism, make the Trinity all separate, discrete entities, not part of the whole as they currently are.

>>51756203
Orthodox are actually even crazier when it comes to saints

>>51756182
I feel angels should be in there, as well. Like, angels and saints are on par powerlevel wise, but have different origins and a different approach to how they execute their domain.

Saints are like Jesus in that they are a manifestation of god's power coming into a human shape, being born as near-omnipotent beings that ascend to heaven once they shed their mortal coil. Much like angels, they return to earth to walk among humans and help execute His grand design or generally just doing their job as patron saints and guardians wherever they can. Prayers spoken in their name will reverberate within their being and thus allow them to let their miracles be cast on that prayer's location, if it is strong enough and the saint deems it worthwhile to answer the prayer.

>>51756155
Christianity, or at the very least Catholocism, is already in practice a polytheistic religion what with practicioners praying to and invoking different saints and angels depending on the what their current situation requires.

>>51768965
That's a great exagerration. And the orthodox are the same plus the idoles.
The saints and angels are only intermediary to God.

>>51769043
>The saints and angels are only intermediary to God.
As has already been explained to me a thousand times over every time I've talked to christians about it, and it's then repeated when I ask what the practical difference between praying to an intermediary and praying to a lesser diety is.

>>51769160
You ask the lesser divinity for something which is her domain, even if she isn't the bigboss because he don't do it.

You ask the saint to report your message to God because you're not worthy to ask such things directly.
You don't venere the saint but you venere the lesser divinity.

>>51756155
Well, there's already the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost, so why not the Second Cousin, the Sacred Wraith, the Stepmother and so on?

>>51769168
But if that was the case there would be no need to pray to different saints or angels, or to pray to them at all as you could just pray directly to the big G, as they just pass the message along. Yet christians take great care to invoke the Archangel Michael is certain situations but not others, for example, and the Lady Magdalene in some but not others.

>>51769179
Not the mention the Holy Gardener, Pablo.

>>51769227
>the Holy Gardener, Pablo.
>not Jesus de Maria

>>51768840

What else would you expect from mystics?

>>51756155
>change

>>51756155
>I want to give Christian players just as much freedom as pagan players.

Why?

If they've chosen to play Christian characters then surely they want to play these characters adhering to one god. Why would you need to create unnecessary variations?

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>>51756155
Santeria or something similar?
>>51768840
What did we do more than catholics, again?
>>51762545
>>51762770
Fun fact:
Among neo-pagan revivalistic zamolxians, there are those who worship God the Lord(we call God some fused together word that at origin means The Lord our God, basically Adonai Elohim) and Jesus in their festivities.
So you have a branch of zamolxians that erect a cross to pray to, in their little area of the meeting grounds.

>>51771941
Oh yeah, that's the symbol of zamolxianism.
Of course, like any neo-pagan movement, you get all sorts of people, from nationalistic /pol/tards to sjws that want their weird polyamorous fantasies and other weird new age projected onto the ancestor's faith.

>>51756155
Take all the major players in the faith usually and make them full-gods in their own right.

>The Father
A distant Creator Deity, possibly an Eldritch Abomination that "likes" mortals.

>The Son
Somehow begotten from the Father, far more "Human", far more personal. Actually loves and understands humanity on a fundamental level, champions them.

>The Spirit
A sort of cosmic Force, personified. Possibly simply a representation of The Light, definitely brought in from an older panetheon or representing very old beliefs in-setting.

>The Mother
Original High Priestess for Father's religion, ascended to join him eventually.

>The Twelve
Eternally reincarnating demigods loyal to the Father and Son (thus explaining the constant 12 motifs in Judeochristianity).

>The Thousandfold
Small Gods.

>>51762845
Oy. As a Frank I feel offended xD

If Saints become minor deities, you could become a god, which would be cool as fuck and not without precedent in other (pagan) religions.
Also, in the Middle Ages, the church explained their "ability" to sell absolution with them being able to use the good deeds of the Saints to "outweigh" your sins. If that isn't an offering to a specific "deity", I don't know what is...

>>51756182
I actually did this in a D&D game back in high school. Clerics chose a patron saint for extra ethos and specialty spells. All prayers were addressed to God via the intercession of a Saint. I went to Catholic High School and had access to a lot of research material for the game and the nun that was the Head Librarian also ran the Games Club helped a lot with the research. Sr Jean Margaret was great.

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>>51756190
Well, the existence of deities can still be ambiguous in a setting with magic.
A Crusader *claims* he saw a vision of angels, and his flaming sword *can* cut through anything, but the Priestess of Freya can talk to animals, shape-shift and seems to be able to see the future. Both of them might claim that their god definitely exists, and the other is a bunch of baloney or a trick by some demon/spirit, but neither can be 100% sure.
Meta-wise there might be a definitive answer, but that shouldn't affect people's in-setting behavior.

>>51772697
I like Saint January, who fought the lion that killed him with his barehands.
Saint Laurent is "funny" too. He is basically the patron saint of "barbecue" because he died on one.

>>51772776
>their god definitely exists, and the other is a bunch of baloney or a trick by some demon/spirit
I can't really see this happening in-universe. Of course the Priestess of Freya's gods exist and are giving her powers, they're all just clearly inferior to *my* gods and the gifts and miracles they can produce. I can see one claiming that the other is being duped by tricksters or is receiving their abilities from questionable sources, but denying the existence of all others is as stupid as a schoolyard kid yelling that only *his* dad is real and everyone else's aren't.

>>51771729
This. I mean, there's more variation in being able to choose to play a polytheist *or* a monotheist than there is in being able to playtwo different varieties of polytheists.

That said, if you really wanted to go the route you have choosen, play up the praying to and invoking of saints and angels.

>>51756155
The video game Diablo does This well enough. Just add more demons that are on Satan's level and promote arch angels like Gabriel to higher status with more power

>>51772497
The Franks are extinct. You may be French or any of the other nationalities that live within the French realm (such as Normandian or Occitan or Betonic), but you're certainly not Frankish.

If you are I may as well call myself a Geat or Vandal or Teuton or any of the other Germanic or Celtic tribes that once lived in southern Scandinavia, or for that matter any of the Finnish or Samic tribes as the chances of me being a pureblood are close to, or less than, zero.

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>>51772930
I dunno, it's pretty common in history to slot other cosmologies in to fit your own. For example, Pagans were sometimes considered devil-worshipers, with their various gods being associated with demons. Christians didn't deny the existence of the Devil, they just thought worshiping him was wrong and sinful. Also depending on the flavor of Christianity they might assume it doesn't work anyways. Iirc, the Conquistadores specifically identified Aztec gods with the Devil and his servants.

So in my example, a Christian Holy Warrior would assume that "Freya" doesn't exist, what the Priestess is worshiping is a demon of some sort that she mistakes for a god, but is in fact subservient to YHWH. Her demonic powers are being permitted by God as a test to his faith, and God shall surely allow him to triumph in the end, etc.

It's the same logic that allowed Christians to keep faith even when the early Islamic Empire was running rough-shod over the Mediterranean. Certainly some assumed that Islam was clearly the true faith due to its victories, but many others just thought that God was testing them by allowing their enemies to triumph.

>>51774124
That's why Attila was seen as the scourge of God. He was here to punish the corrupted.

>>51756155
My making a not!Christianity with a pantheon under the authority of the chief god.
Basically turn the current angles into lower ranked gods.

Catholicism already exists.
That's literally how a Christian DM of mine does things; there are no other gods; just Saints who grant the pious holy abilities. He doesn't allow for evil characters who worship other gods at the table, so no evil aligned magic users.

It may sound lame, but it had the most intense Deus Vult moment of any campaign I've been in, where we solemnly agreed that it was what God would want.

>>51774124
I wish people who made macros would have someone intelligent look them over for obvious spelling errors before posting them on the Internet.

>>51756370
You mean most non-European cultures forced to do Catholicism? Even the current Pope fussed at people for being disingenuous Christians because he knew they were really just worshiping their old gods while pretending they're saints when he went to South America.

>>51756155
Saints as others have said, you could also go REAL old school and have there be God and gods/"gods", God is supreme but he's not the only god, though the others are a mix weak, evil, or otherwise unworthy of worship (of course those last two maybe just be a matter of opinion)

>>51762145
>>51774497
Nice baits.

>>51765529
Its interesting if you research ancient Semitic religion you can see him slowly devouring the other gods in the pantheon and marrying the goddesses.

>>51756155
Saints.