The Unified Brotherhood is a newly established political force of heretical religious intellectualism that opposes the previous Religious Rule of The Conservative Brotherhood under the Holy Emperor believing that the Unity Council should rule by the sword and force all to convert to the faith of the Unified Brotherhood.
Once the descendant of Russian Eastern Orthodox settlers on the world of Byzanthine, they teach Celestial Meditation and Conversion by the Sword. They would appear as heretics to the Conservative Brotherhood which in turn would have appeared to be quite a schism from the Eastern Orthodoxy of Old Terra.
They worship the YEHOVAH, the Three-In-One. The Trimvirate God. The One True God. All other gods, in stark contrast to the Hegemony, are false before the might of YEHOVAH. They believe that to be close to YEHOVAH you must meditate and pray in space, before the light of the stars. To this end, most of their ships have armored solariums which look out into space, or in lieu of that, meditation suits, allowing long term EVA for such holy contemplations.
The reason for this schism is one Konstantin Zhukov. A warrior prophet who arose from the Conservative Brotherhood and spread the New Word to the people. Emboldened by their new found faith and this charismatic and passionate warpriest, they fought against the Holy Emperor until they finally overthrew him and slew his family, ending the "Line of the Beast" as they would call it.
Much of their belief is based on an incomplete copy of the Bible from Old Terra, but with two additional books added. Their original prophet, Yusuf of Belgorod, came with them to Bynzanthine and it was he who penned the "Великие работы" or the "Great Work" which speaks of the times upon Old Terra preparing for the pilgrimages into the Heavens. However, Konstantin wrote the "Меч иТруба" translated as "Sword & Trumpet" to foretell the end-times, when YEHOVAH would send his emissaries to destroy the universe and carry the faithful on to the Рай where they will live eternally with YEHOVAH.
Konstantin says that this can only be accomplished if you achieve transcendence through Celestial Meditation or convert a heathen to the True Faith.
The Unified Brotherhood is made up of the Presbyters, who are the priests of the order. The Ecumenical Patriarch is the chief and ruling Presbyter above all others and his authority of the Canon is equivalent of that of Konstantin Zhukov's legacy. Below him are the Bishops, several of them responsible for each system. They all display the Miracles of the True Faith on a daily basis. Healing the sick, blessing the Righteous. Seeing into the hearts of men. Being in many places at once and moving objects with merely a prayer. Such is their Faith in YEHOVAH that He grants them great and miraculous powers. It is said that anyone who is a True Believer will be granted such power.
The Church controls the military almost completely. The vast majority of their ground forces are known as LEGION. Little more with conscripts with crude mass produce weapons, they are used to swarm the enemy. In some ways, the Unified Brotherhood has more people than sense. The TEMPLAR operate as the guard of the Presbyters and their martial representatives.
The ARKANGELOS operate as the elite assault troops of the Unified Brotherhood. They are champions of the faith and stand on par with the TEMPLAR in many cases and execute the orders of the Presbyters without question.
Other orders of their military include the HORSEMEN, the FALLEN, and the HOSPITALER. The functions of this structures are so far unknown as they have been rarely if at all encountered by frontline forces.
The common folk of the Brotherhood seem woefully under represented and provided for. The standard of living is below that of the Hegemony by several orders of magnitude. It is the opinion of the Office of Special Intelligence that this is intentional to keep the Presbyters in power.
Further updates to follow.
This message was last edited by the GM at 06:50, Mon 27 July 2015.
