The Birth Heresy



"In the beginning there was nothing, and then there was sex, right" -King Clovald Butterfly mocking Birthism-



The birth heresy is usually associated with the Dark ages, but it actually began in the late years of Soupina's Reign. Birthism in it's most basic form, is the belief that Celestia didn't actually create the world, but instead gave birth to it. Birthism began as an academic dispute among the learned clergy, in its early years it stayed in the clergy and the laity was hardly aware of it. Queen Galaxian was the first queen to notice it and in a letter to the high priestess of the Celestrum of Mewni she writes "I find the matter is trivial, and will not involve myself in some monkish quarrel."



Some arguments for Birthism were that creation was degrading, both to Celestia herself and to the universe, that creation was unwomanly, and that the world being begotten not made did greater justice to its goodness and beauty. Orthodox believers countered, that the world was rational, and therefore had to be rationally created and couldn't have come into being through an irrational process like birth.



That was basically the debate as it originally stood in those early years. but it didn't in the theological circles that birthed it oh no. As Galaxians reign reached its midpoint, popular versions of Birthism began to appear, and these popular versions went straight to the logic of, if the universe had a mother it must have had a father as well. Hence various father gods began to be posited.



There were several father gods in the early years but eventually, three would eclipse the others, each associated with a different variant of popular Birthism. These three were Logos, associated with Matrimonialism, Sophia (Wisdom) associated with Hedonism, and Yaldabaoth (pronounced eye-el-dab-ea-oath) associated with Pessimism.



Art is instructive here, in surviving Birthist artwork, Logos is usually depicted as tall youthful and physically fit. the classic Ideal of what a man should be, along the lines of what you'd see in a Silvan statue. Sophia, by contrast, is usually depicted as small weak and effeminate if not androgynous often looking more "Beautiful" than handsome. Yaldabaoth is usually depicted as ugly in some way, often he's fat, overly muscular and covered in body hair with an unkempt beard. In the words of Elanore Thistle "Logos is who women want for their husband, Sophia is who they want for their lover and Yaldabaoth is who they don't want for anything."



Matrimonialism



Matrimonialists worship Logos who, as their name implies, they believe to be married to Celestia. This was the most popular form of Birthism throughout the dark ages. Queen Helia, who was probably agnostic herself, tolerated Matrimonialism because she believed it taught virtue to young men. Her heirs would regret this toleration because later on, Matrimonialism would take on a political aspect. from the reign of Celestia onward Matrimonialism became the religion of people who didn't like the Butterfly monarchy. If you were angry about Celestia's winter you became a matrimonialist, if you didn't support Meteora's wars you became a matrimonialist, if you thought Hekatia should lay off the necromancy you became a matrimonialist and so on.



This Political dimension of Matremonialism, lead Matrimonialists to support a dual dynastic monarchy. In this system, there would be two royal families instead of one, one "The Dragonflies" as they were hypothetically called would always produce the King while the other, the Butterflies or some theoretical replacement, would always produce the queen. This Dragonfly King and Butterfly Queen would then rule as co-equals whether they were married or not. Unsurprisingly Queen Meteora found this seditious and declared matrimonialism illegal.



Hedonism



"A bunch of worthless cads who worship unmanliness and destroy family and town alike" -King Norse Fields-



Hedonists worshiped Sophia, who was male in most versions despite his female name, in their mythology Sophia was not married to Celestia as Logos was, but rather the two of them met spontaneously for sex and then departed from each other, King Dias jokingly called this version "one-night standism". Hedonists were as far from matrimonialists as you could get, they believed marriage was an artificial construct and that they should get back to their lost innocence by following "The Wisdom" of Sophia, in other words by having lots and lots of extramarital sex.



The also tended to be fanatical supporters of the Queen, because they believed, wrongly, that Queen Venus had been one of their own, as well as the dark ages yarn about the queens all being sexual libertines. When greeting the Queen a hedonist, regardless of age or sex, was supposed to get down an all fours, close their eyes, open their mouths and hang out their tongue in an offering of oral pleasure. Queen Meteora responded with a decree that anyone who did this in her presence was to have their tongue cut out.



As you've probably guessed, Hedonist worship services usually devolved into wild parties, and their Celestrums were full of pornographic imagery. their communities tended to be poor and crime-ridden because of the abundance of absentee fathers. to this day, a poor area in a Mewnian town or city is often referred to as "Sophian".



Pessimism



The least popular but most infamous if the three. Pessimist believed in but didn't necessarily worship Yaldabaoth. Who they believed was guilty of raping Celestia, and for that reason, the born world was necessarily evil. Pessimists tended to be misanthropic contrarian and apolitical. they considered the world and everything in it to be totally evil and congratulated themselves for realizing that.



Of course, the idea that Celestia had been the victim of Rape was an outrage to Orthodox believers and this version of Birthism was outlawed before any other during the reign of Venus.



Other Variants



There were, of course, branch variants of these basic three, one version of Matrimonialism taught that Celestia and logos were in a perpetual state of population and thus the universe was expanding. A variant of Pessimism taught that following her rape, Celestia castrated Yaldabaoth and the blood from his genitals became the monsters.



Other versions taught that Celestia had only given birth to solid matter, liquid matter coming from her tears, perspiration, and breastmilk, and gas coming from her heavy breathing. another variant claimed that Celestia had in fact created the material world and instead gave birth to a set of twins who would be the first parents of all mewmans, in the beginning, there was nothing and then there was incest, yuck.



Still another variant tried to get around the "rational universe" objection, by saying that Logos and Celestia had copulated "in mind as well as in body". and that this literal "mind screw" had somehow resulted in the birth of the rational universe. and there were others that went way off the rails attempting to explain the origins of Celestia and whatever father god by creating huge pantheons of higher gods that somehow begot them.



End



Birthism was never very popular, it's believed to have made up about 20% of the Mewnian population at its height. Its history was a bitter one, Birthists regularly got into fights with orthodox believers and the two groups frequently burned down each others Celestrums. and most variants of Birthism were persecuted on and off from the reign of Meteora onward.



By the time Vesper came to the throne there were very few Birthists left, most of them matrimonialists. after the dark ages, Birthism would continue to slowly disappear until the reign of Diana when it would become extinct although I'm told prostitutes still sometimes take oaths to Sophia as an old tradition of the trade.



-The Royal Farmer-