Catholic Order of Psis
 

The Code of Honor for Telepaths thread reminded me of something I recall from the playtest draft for GURPS Alternate Earths.

One of the worlds had a Catholic order of psis.

It started when a priest discovered he had the ability to read peoples' minds and to alter them. He realized the potential benefits and dangers of his power. He was conflicted because altering someone's mind took away their free will and thus their ability to turn away from sin.

He ended up founding an order of psis within the church. They were sworn to only use their powers in two ways:

Treatment of the mentally ill.

Suppression of rogue psis. They would hunt down any psis and try to get them to join the order. Those who refused would have their minds altered to remove their psi power and any knowledge that psi powers exists. No other alteration was permitted.

That world did not make the cut for the book. I know I saw the world published later, but the order of psis part had been dropped. The world might have been the one with the jet planes in World War I, but maybe not.

Did that order ever get published somewhere else?

Re: Catholic Order of Psis
 

I think that was Louis d'Antares' world. I don't know if it was ever given a write up on E23, but I'm sure it wasn't in AE 1 or 2.

Re: Catholic Order of Psis
 

I believe Louis d'Antares' world is Cyrano, published in GURPS Infinite Worlds: Lost Worlds

But I don't think that is the world I am thinking of. In the world I recall there psionics was secret, known to no one except the order. Which made it easy to cut out, of course.

Re: Catholic Order of Psis
 

I wasn't in the AE1 playtest, but I believe it had "Stuart" with psionics, which got rewritten into Aeolus in AE2 (which is a steampunky anarchists-with-airplanes timeline).

Re: Catholic Order of Psis
 

Now that is a scary thought!

What definition is this? Thought crimes are health crimes!

I suggest Toquemada from Nemisis the Warlock

Just imagine an Opus Dei version.

Or an order against Telephaths because it is a hersey!

Re: Catholic Order of Psis
 

If that was what was intended, surely treatment of the mentally ill would include forced conversion. I would have to know more about the context. Otherwise I would simply assume that they would be used for treating generally accepted mental illness like a non-psi therapist would.

Re: Catholic Order of Psis
 

Julian May's Exiles Saga and Galactic Millieu books feature something like this. Mostly benevolent psychic aliens turn out to have a churchlike system of social conservation and guardianship, the prevalence of Catholic families among the emerging psychics of earth end up giving the humans' guardians a similar internal order including an order of redactors (telepathic/empathic healers) dedicated to a martyred psychic who had suffered unhealing wounds in life.

Re: Catholic Order of Psis
 

On the whole I think the world where a priest discovers telepathy and uses it to create an order of anti-heresy thought police is more interesting.

Re: Catholic Order of Psis
 

As I recall, the telepaths all worked in mental hospitals, so only mental illness requiring hospitalization would qualify.

Re: Catholic Order of Psis
 

At one time homosexuality was considered a mental illness.

Despite all the aspects for the causes of good deeds there are a myriad of ways of doing other 'good' deeds.

It's an interesting concept but there could be those out there to use it to their own goals and desires.

Also the Catholic church was against democracy, ie universal sufferage. Issues regarding abortion and rape. Not forgetting the crisis of molestation.

Given this is a 'Catholic' inspired religion of fantasy many of its real life 'woes' could pop up as themes. It would be like mythos, don't let the priest get you. Body Snatchers meets Stepford Wives.

BTW the last bit is like B5's Psi Corps

Re: Catholic Order of Psis
 

Really has nothing to do with the subject at hand.

Perhaps more to the point, the idea seems to require telepathy to be the only psi power.

Re: Catholic Order of Psis
 

WellI was trying to demonstrate what can be perceived as a mental illness. Mental illness has changed, we do not use 'hysteria' for example.

Like I said that, within context, this could be like Babylon 5's Psi Corp.

IIRC some of this was covered in Psionic Powers 3rd ed.

Power behind the throne.

Or they could be genuinely good people trying to steer humanity on to the correct path. And there have been many organisations like those.

Re: Catholic Order of Psis
 

I'm pretty sure that a psi is, by biblical standards, a witch tainted by Satan.

If you get past that somehow, I think a catholic order of Psi's is about the most terrifying notion I've ever heard of.

Re: Catholic Order of Psis
 

It's not just me then ;p

Re: Catholic Order of Psis
 

Unless it get's declared a Divine Blessing. Basically those that are willing to join the order are obviously blessed, where as those that oppose the church and it's holy order of psi are obviously Witches pretending to have the blessing to sow doubt.

Re: Catholic Order of Psis
 

The Bible doesn't recognize the concept of psionics. A witch would be someone attempting to interact with evil spirits. If psionics is a power innate to humans if undiscovered, then obviously it would not be witchcraft.

Re: Catholic Order of Psis
 

innate to humans would also be 'gift from our creator'

Re: Catholic Order of Psis
 

As RogueBFL says, the Bible recognizes at least one person (Joseph the patriarch) who is gifted with ESP, and various other examples of people with uncanny abilities that are not put down to evil spirits, though Protestants' mileage may vary.

Christopher Stasheff has a lengthy THE WARLOCK... series where psis are known as "witches and warlocks" on a backward planet but a reform movement has convinced the crown and church there to allow them to serve by demonstrating they command the evil spirits (illusions and animated flora) rather than vice versa.

Re: Catholic Order of Psis
 

Growing up Opus Dei, Smurf hit the nail on the head.

First off a priest who can read minds would notice all the hypocrisy going around in the first place. And remember a lot of people didn't need to read minds to find that out. Now if this Priest's superiors ever discovered he could read minds, they were in real trouble. He would have a crisis of faith instantly. If the priest never altered the minds of his superiors then he would be dead, end of story.