San Hera

San Hera is one of the Great Saints of the Bastonian Pantheon, elevated to godhood by the Almighty Herself to be an example to her chosen people, the Bastonians. She is known as a patron of home, hearth, and love, by some as the patron of comforts and others as the patron of romance.

San Hera's symbol is a stylized cottage. Chickens and other farm-yard fowl are considered sacred to her.

History

San Hera was elevated by the Almighty after the foundation of Bastonia and the original elevation of San Heather and San Lukas. Her legend speaks of a devout follower of the almighty, of commoner birth, who maintained a large and charitable habitation in Whiterock, which was a mixture of an orphanage and poorhouse. This endeavour was her true life's work, requiring her constant attention, and throughout which she made a great many personal sacrifices, never having married or grown her wealth.

For their efforts, they was elevated to Sainthood and immediately ascended to Heaven, serving the Almighty as the Keeper of the Heavenly Hearth, one of their many epithets. Since then, they have become known in particular for their patronage of mothers, homemakers, homesteaders, farmers, and lovers.

Relationships

It is a true statement to say that San Hera has the respect and admiration of most of the other Great Saints. Her portfolio keeps her nearly as engaged as [the Almighty] herself, and while she no longer has direct control of her complex in Whiterock, she remains a high-order interventionist and matronly figure across the entire pantheon. In particular, it is rumoured that San Lauren and herself share some form of unrequited or unacted upon romantic affiliation.

Hera is unique among the Great Saints in that she has truly embraced the call for rehabilitation of San Verus and San Meteo. Though herself and San Verus are particularly opposed in alignment, she mostly views the Mad Saint as a pitiable and unenviable being, who needs for care and comfort if he is ever to hope to be saved. By contrast she is cool and suspicious toward San Meteo, though cordial and polite to a degree some other Saints remain dangerous.

San Hera's instinct to rehabilitation does not extend as far as the Enemy, whose own enemies she will give succor to regardless of them being followers of hers or not.

Appearance

San Hera has a mutable appearance, appearing variously as a young maiden, a charming matron, or even a wizened crone, as the mood and needs of the moment strike. She is always depicted wearing an apron upon which the Almighty's shield has been embroidered, blazoned with her stylized house glyph.

Realm

Hera maintains her own realm within Heaven, known as the Highest Hearth. This enormous home with its grand halls and kitchens is the spiritual expression of her mortal efforts, and in addition to the usual inhabitants, plays host to all manner of souls of various stages of refinement.

Providence

San Hera's providence, when shown to her devotees, typically manifests as unexpected gifts or bounties of harvest. As her mission is relatively ordinary, she does not often send portents or create oracles, doing so only in moments of dire and immediate threat.

Servants

Hera is served in the Highest Hearth by a cohort of angels.

Unique Servants

Epslay

Epslay is a heavy horse of a pure white coat hoofed in mithril, who understands common and does not speak.

Hearthsong

Hearthsong is a celestial phoenix with the power of shape-shifting who serves as Hera's herald. She is frequently sent to places where Hera's intercession is strongly desired or where Hera sees the need to communicate dire warnings.

The Bastonian Church

The bastonian church is unified in the worship of The Almighty, which is observed by not just her direct followers, but even by those patronized by the other Saints of the Pantheon. The church teaches the performance of good works and the cultivation of compassion as the roadmap to ultimate salvation and an afterlife spent in Heaven.

Devotees of San Hera are known as the Herites.

Worshippers

All Bastonians worship the Almighty, and some further dedicate themselves to the saintly wizard, San Sylvester. Their clergy make up its own order within the Bastonian Church, the Laurentians, who have a ranking structure similar to the hierarchy of the church at large.

Herite worshippers tend toward humble professions close to home, and include homemakers, mothers and the expectant, young lovers, and pastoral priests.

Clergy

As what the Bastonian Church calls a religious order, the Herites have their own standard of dress, comprising black habits with white, apron-like scapulars. Herite clergy make up a significant subset of the actual church clergy, both as monastics and as parish priests.

Herite priests and priestesses very often oversee birthing and marriage rites. Non-pastoral Herite clergy often run institutions for the poor, ill, or orphaned, and the order has a history of specialized education and training around providing such care. Such individuals are not-uncommon healers found in formal military units such as those of the Chivalric Orders, and the Herite orders even have their own such order, the Knights Hospitalier.

Temples & Shrines

Like much the rest of Bastonian architecture, temples and shrines to the Almighty are often masterworks of masonry or stonework, which in wealthy communities are often further embellished with stained glass and frescos, depicting a popular saint in the region or scenes from the sacred texts. Such structures are usually subdivided internally, with an area for public ceremony and worship (which is frequent) and an area for the sole use of the clergy and those who serve the clergy in liturgical preparation, and temple complexes almost always include an outbuilding or suite of rooms known as the rectory, where the priests serving a particular temple have residence.

Many households have small busts of depictions of San Hera above their hearths or otherwise present in the home, of varying quality.

Holy Texts

In addition to the holy texts used in the worship of the Almighty, members of the Laurentian order follow a document called the Rule of San Hera. This small book is written in a patern of blank verse meant to be easily memorized, and even in a small handbook format would only be, at its outmost, a hundred pages. These documents are produced in great quantity and some Herite orders are able to create them so quickly and cheaply that the books themselves are given away for free.

Church History

The church and the state are intimately connected within Bastonia, with the state relying on the church for its legitimacy and the church relying on the state's realpolitikal power to stay in rule. The Almighty's church is considered coterminous with those of all other saints and is the only legally-permitted form of open worship within the Kingdom.

Holidays

San Hera's feast day is the Spring Equinox, marked with feasting and the giving of small gifts of practical goods such as blankets, new clothing, and the like. She is frequently invoked throughout the rest of the liturgical year, for weddings, birthing's, and the like. Some communities centralize her worship during planting festivals at the start of agricultural seasons.

Favoured Animals

Chickens, especially hens, and the females of other species of common fowl are considered sacred to Hera.