Better Religions in RPG Settings

On some level, I don’t think it’s really possible for most of us (at least in the predominantly secular global North) to build a fictional religion that truly captures the texture, essence, and dizzying complexity of real-life religion. Religion just doesn’t affect our lives nearly as much as it once did, and while its influence is still considerable, it’s mediated through the Scientific Revolution and a specifically Christian (maybe even Protestant) conception of what religion is.

In tabletop roleplaying games specifically, religion often boils down to what deity’s name is written on the cleric’s character sheet. That works fine for most games, but I’d love for there to be more color and texture to the fictional religions we include in our campaign settings. And it’d be great if we could create more than just Christianity or Greek/Roman polytheism with the serial numbers filed off.

I don’t have a complete answer on how to do religion better in RPGs, but I have some thoughts. I got the idea for this post from watching Religion for Breakfast’s videos about the religion and demonology of The Legend of Zelda. In the first video, host Andrew Mark Henry mentions a book titled God Is Not One by Boston University professor Stephen Prothero. In it, Prothero argues that different religions address different problems, and don’t all take different paths toward the same goal. He also offers a four-point rubric for how to assess each religion’s approach.

To be clear, I haven’t actually read the book all the way through (I might in the future, though!). I just wanted to take the basic framework and apply it to RPGs.

Anyway, according to Prothero, each religion articulates:

• A problem
• A solution to this problem, which also serves as the religious goal
• A technique (or techniques) for moving from this problem to this solution
• An exemplar (or exemplars) who chart this path from problem to solution

He provides two examples immediately afterward. For Christianity:

• The problem is sin
• The solution (or goal) is salvation
• The technique for achieving salvation is some combination of faith and good works
• The exemplars who chart this path are the saints in Roman Catholicism and Orthodoxy and ordinary people of faith in Protestantism

And for Buddhism:

• The problem is suffering
• The solution (or goal) is nirvana
• The technique for achieving nirvana is the Noble Eightfold Path, which includes such classic Buddhist practices as meditation and chanting
• The exemplars who chart this path are arhats (for Theravada Buddhists), bodhisattvas (for Mahayana Buddhists), or lamas (for Vajrayana Buddhists)

(that both Christians and Buddhists might have qualms with the above is a feature, not a bug — it provides a scheme for easily understanding differences between religions, but also provides an axis for understanding at least some differences within religions.)

Now, this is really, really optional. You can get by just fine with a handful of names for deities (or just one, maybe!) for your cleric to worship.

That rubric is good, but I have a few additions I’m borrowing from a post in Religion for Breakfast’s Patreon (you’ll need to be a patron to see it). My version of the rubric, with an emphasis on utility in worldbuilding, is as follows:

• A problem with people and the world
• A solution to this problem, providing a ‘goal’ for the religion
• Techniques for moving from the problem to the solution
• Exemplars who chart this path from problem to solution
• Internal differences (they likely agree on the problem, may or may not agree on the solution, and probably don’t agree on the techniques and exemplars)
• “Lived religion” — that is, contradictions between what ordinary people believe and practice and what’s espoused by the religion’s elites
• Evidence of syncretism, the blending of of different beliefs and practices across cultures, and the influence of different religions on each other

Let’s come up with an example — a religion in which there are many gods, ghosts, and spirits which inhabit this world, who can inflict fortune or suffering depending on how humans behave (toward them and toward each other).

• The problem is chaos — the misfortunes that arise when people live in hate and lawlessness, and forget to attend to spiritual matters.
• The solution is harmony with gods, ghosts, and spirits, the preservation of peace in the material and immaterial world.
• The technique for achieving harmony is to follow the guidance of the Canon, an ever-evolving collection of poems, songs, sacred sayings, legal rulings, and ritual procedures. The Canon spells out how to treat one another, how to organize family and society, and how to negotiate with supernatural beings.
• The exemplars who chart this path are sorcerers — religious figures, usually women, who cast spells and lead ceremonies that treat with the unseen world. Other exemplars include a sorcerer’s husbands, known as attendants, who are charged with assisting the sorcerer and ensuring worldly adherence to the prescriptions of the Canon.
• Most internal differences revolve around the composition of the Canon. Different schools of thought borrow from different teachers and emphasize different practices. Notable points of contention include acceptance or rejection of adorcism (possession by spirits), the presence or absence of monastic orders, and the relative importance of a solar deity.
• Evidence for lived religion includes what is broadly termed witchcraft — spiritual activity conducted without the mediation of sorcerers educated in the Canon. This can range from merely misguided to outright malevolent, but it always carries dangerous consequences for the practitioners and their associates.
• Evidence of syncretism includes the veneration of a supreme sun god, a practice borrowed from foreign sun cults and adopted by some sects of the religion. Some versions of the Canon even directly include portions of holy texts from other religions.

This is just an example, but can you see what I’m going for? I think if you’re worldbuilding a religion, it’s much better to start with its internal logic, the thing that — on a very high level — the religion is about. Once you have that down, you can then come up with gods, rituals, holy sites, stories, and all the rest.

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