The Church and the State

There are many tools available to authoritive figures to maintain their goals or to achieve them, be it political or religious.

But the one that strikes true to the hearts of the people is Cooperation. Civilisation was built on the idea that more cooperation makes for a better society. Marx and Engels' Manifesto of the Communist Party refered to it is "Primitive Communism", and it was this virtue that became the guiding principle of political ideologies, not only among left-leaning Socialists and Liberals, but also among the rightist Conservative movement.

Society can't work unless it manages to put aside is petty differences and work together towards the greater good.

Only a few weeks ago, my country went through the most important General Election it's seen in thirteen years. And at the end, nobody had won. But the Liberals and Conservatives managed to put apart their own differences and work together to create a strong government in the national interest, despite coming from nominally opposing ideologies.

Not too long ago, the two opposing forces of the Church and the Party decided to end our long rivarly and conflict and form a Coalition of State and Church in order to allow both to co-exist against the proverbial Nuclear threat from the "Church of AKB", a term that you may remember I coined in an earlier message to it's members to refer to the loose organisation of fans, rather than a specific Church. An organisation which I have on multiple occasions likened to the Red Terror in the East, and the tense relationship between myself and leading AKB fans to the NATO-USSR relations of the Cold War years.

But it was through this, that we came to realise that the Captainist Party and the Church of Maasa aren't at all dissimiliar. We may use different words and methods, but the intentions are the same. We both wish for the exact same thing.

The Church is no longer the same cruel body that it was when I initially founded it, where Maasa was the One True Idol and fans of any other members were shunned as heretics and infidel. No, we are more open and forgiving than ever, just so long as the people support and worship Maasa, we care not wether they are also fans of other Idols, false or not. The Church has recieved two new Clergy members in recent weeks, Garlix, a leading member of the Captainist Party, and Keksi*Choc, who is one of the leading Miyabi fans as well as a self-proclaimed Prophet of Maasa.

Clearly we are entering something of a Rennaisance for the Church, where openness and community are just as important to the way we work as faith in the Holy Mother herself. We should continue to push for more support for Maasa, and continue to reform the Church into something that all Maasa fans can be proud to be part of.

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Do You Read the Bible?

Well there's this passage I got memorized. Ezekiel 25:17:

The path of the righteous idol is beset on all sides by the scandals of the selfish and the tyranny of evil press. Blessed is she who, in the name of Tsunku and good music, shepherds the weak singers through PVs of darkness, for she is truly her sister's keeper and the finder of lost solos. And I will arm-wrestle thee with great vengeance and furious anger those who attempt to stalk and scandalize my group-mates. And you will know my name is Sudou when I lay my vengeance upon thee.

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L'Entente Cordiale

Recently the Church was approached by a delegation from our old enemy - the Captainist Party. The delegation (id est, The Garlix) and I came to an agreement that both must cease all rivalries if both are to survive.

The history of conflict goes back to before the formation of the Church. Attempts to get Maasa's title changed from "2nd Berryz Tower" to "World's Strongest Idol" was met by much resistence from Captain supporters who claimed that she was far stronger than Maasa. Debates and arguements went on for days, both sides attacking the other with propoganda and fighting amongst themselves. It was from this time of turmoil and tension that two organisations rose to claim responsibility. One was the proposal and formation of the Church of Maasa - a church with faith in Maasa as our Holy Mother and One True Idol. The other was the rise to prominance of the Captainist Party - a political organisation which puts a Captainist spin on Communist theology.

Although the initial conflict ended in the Church's favour with the title of World's Strongest Idol rightly given to Maasa, they two groups seized whatever opportunity they could to assert their own superiority over the other.

However, we both came to the unanimous agreement that it would be in the interests of all involved to cease hostilities and to come together in order to strengthen our defence of the status quo against the increasing threat of invasion from the AKB hordes. An enemy shared leads to a friendship shared.

This alliance, which I am calling L'Entente Cordiale after the Anglo-Franco treaty signed in the early 20th Century which brought about an end to centuries of fighting between the two empires, comes despite the anti-religion tendency of Communist bodies. Perhaps because of the number of Maaists, or at least Maasa fans, within the Party. While it might be against our code to Idolise anyone other than Maasa, in the spirit of the Entente those who choose to support Captain rather than Maasa shall not be mistreated for their beliefs. In the face of the AKB terror, both east and west, both Church and State, both Maa and Captain must remain strong and unified.

Brothers. Sisters. Comrades.

Viva l'Entente Cordiale!

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Symbolism

After a conversation on wotachat, I decided to alter the Church of Maasa a bit, I hope the changes will please whoever reads this and will show in future posts. One of the most obvious changes at the moment, though, would be the theme. A slight change in colours, which I think is a little more pleasing to the eye than the old white and blue theme, and a new banner. The banner is simple, but contains a bit of symbolism, so I thought I'd devote this brief entry to talking about what this all means.

Now, the banner as a whole shows an image of the Japanese sun early in the morning. Using a sunrise was quite important for two reasons, the second of which I'll go into shortly, but the first reason was a simple one. This is all about Maasa, a Japanese Idol, who, like most Japanese Idols, comes from Japan. And what other name is Japan famous for? That's right. It's the Land of the Rising Sun. In fact, I hear that name is what the Japanese name for their own country 「日本」 ("Nihon") translates to; the first character referring to the sun, and the second character meaning "root" or "origin". The sun already has some sort of spiritual and cultural significance which can be adapted for the Church's use.

Now, the first thing you probably notice when you look at it is the symbol (which has been adopted as the symbol of the Church) which has been conspicuously placed on top of the image. I looked across a lot of ancient imagery such as this one, and in the end decided to adapt this for the Church symbol. Now, I'll assume you have no knowledge at all about this symbol or where it comes from and explain all that to you now. This is a Lauburu, or Basque Cross. The shape is the same, but I have changed the colour to red. Why red? For one, the colour is eye-catching, which is why lots of different political groups adopted the colour red. Communists and Nazi's alike used the colour because if you fly your flags and symbols around as propaganda, you want it to catch a lot of people's attention, and red serves this purpose much better than most other colours. I'm pretty sure that the image on the right there is distracting you right now as you read this, and will stick in your mind for some time after you leave this page. At least, that's what I'd hope, because if that's the case, it has served it's purpose as a religious symbol well. The other main reason is because it is almost reminiscent of the National Flag of Japan and, like that flag, of the sun itself. We've come full circle, haven't we? Please excuse that terrible pun, it was unintended. Honest.

Now, you may or may not have noticed the Lauburu's resemblance to a Swastika. And in fact, it could be considered a Swastika, or at least a distant cousin of one. And, like swastikas, is generally used as a symbol of luck and prosperity. The Lauburu is a symbol fairly unique to Basque Country, and by the 16th Century were used unsparingly as decoration in Basque. The meaning of the symbol itself is quite disputed, whether each head represents each of the classic elements (Air, Water, Fire and Earth) or Life, Spirit, Consciousness and Form (is also one of the theories). People also believe the direction of the image (note that the Church uses a right-facing) denotes different meanings, albeit the right-facing lauburu signifying life and the left-facing with death. It has also been said to be a solar symbol.

This takes me back to the sunrise. With the right-facing lauburu said to signify life, and as a solar symbol, it matches up with the same spiritual significance of the sunrise in cultures around the world. The sun was worshipped by cults and ancient pagan religions as a symbol of life, as the sun provides life to everything on this planet. And by putting the symbol of the Church (and by extension of Maasa) inside the rising sun, the whole image symbolises the rise of the Church.

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The Reincarnate Theory

First off, my apologies again for not updating the site in over a month. As I posted on my other blog, I had the flu through most of December and was too ill to even think about writing. But here I am again, fit as a fiddle (almost), and sharing with the Church the first of a number of different theories about the world in which we live, and the deity we worship, Sudou Maasa.

The first theory is the Reincarnate Theory - those who believe that Maasa, though physically only an adolescent, is indeed spiritually most ancient. They believe that Maasa reincarnates in a new body after death, much the same way as the Tibetans view their own Spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama. This being the case, an ancient line of Maasa can be traced back through millennia. The theory, however, is fairly recent and lacks substantial evidence for officials to research such a lineage, and because records are non-existent, to even attempt to do so would be nigh impossible.

Faith, however, is defined as "belief in spite of no evidence". And even though the theory has been impossible to prove (or disprove), there are those that cling to it as fact. In fact, the mystery surrounding the facts of the story is somewhat alluring, which is probably what drove many Maasa believers to rally behind it.

The theory itself does leave many blanks due to lack of information, the age of the original Maasa, or indeed the universe itself, remains a mystery. This has led to some believers taking up certain beliefs from other theories too, including science's Theory of Evolution and Big Bang. With evolution in mind, it is possible that the original Maasa may not have even been a modern human, but rather a lesser evolved form of man. Some tribal leaders, including the original Maasa, may have thought of herself as someone with divine-right to lead the tribe, and other members of the tribe believe she was a god. Some pro-Maasa scientists have theorized that when the original leader died, the tribe would appoint a new leader and god, this could have developed into the Reincarnation theory at some point in history when religion became more central and organised.

The current Maasa is probably the reason the Church has become known, however. Previous incarnations were probably not so well-known, and of course she herself wouldn't know of her spiritual legacy. But now that she has a role where all of Japan knows of her, or at least of Berryz Koubou, the beliefs themselves have gotten some publicity. After all, who wouldn't want to believe that such a girl was indeed some form of divine spirit?

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