The supreme and only divine power of Faith is called The One — entirely transcendent within creation, yet wholly immanent for those who have Faith. The One is devoid of human characteristics in essence but made human through an infinite series of manifestations whenever humanity requires refocusing. The One is manifest to the Faithful through Love.
Each person can directly experience and communicate with The One without intermediary. Discussion of The One beyond direct experience is regarded as futile. Philosophy and theological speculation are wholly rejected by the Faithful — not out of anti-intellectualism, but because The One is not an idea to be comprehended but a presence to be experienced.
This triad — Death, Ignorance, Sin — is what the Faithful call the corruption of the natural manifestation. The professor of Faith works toward their destruction not through self-mortification or ritual observance, but through the lived practice of the Life, Truth, and Way.
When asked about salvation by his earliest followers, Vinaii spoke of an individual on Earth — a figure he called the Life, the Truth, and the Way — who perfectly demonstrated the accomplishment of salvation and was killed for the same teaching Vinaii gave, yet raised to life and living still. It is generally agreed among historians and adherents alike that Vinaii was speaking of Yeshua of Nazareth.
This figure is not worshipped directly by the Faithful, but serves as the supreme demonstration of what The One wills for all persons: the complete destruction of Death, Ignorance, and Sin and the full realization of the natural manifestation. The Faithful call this God's Salvation — a completed act. There is nothing left to accomplish; it is finished. The Faithful only give this finished reality in their service to others.
Vinaii taught the Twenty One Revelations orally over a period of twenty one years, revealing one per year from SY 96 to SY 117. They are the whole of his doctrinal teaching. He expressly forbade committing them to writing, saying that to do so would be to mistake the written word for Life itself, welcoming Ignorance. They are not facts to be intellectually catalogued — they are beginning points for the continued progression of real experience of The One. To know each Revelation fully and in reality is to know the Life, Truth, and Way. To know all twenty one is to know The One.
They are divided into three groups of seven, correlating with the Life, Truth, and Way respectively.
Apart from the Twenty One Revelations, Vinaii distilled all of real religion to two ultimate ethical commands, which he called the heart and center of all genuine spiritual practice.
Vinaii placed four universal prohibitions on all Faithful. Beyond these four, all further prohibitions are matters of individual conscience.
Faith exists in the mundane and does not seek ritual or mystical experience as such. Daily life is its practice. Conversion is simply a profession of Faith as the Faithful know it.
There is nothing to be accomplished in Faith — it is finished, it is done. The Faithful only give the reality of this finished fact in their service to others. The embrace of this service is what Faith calls enlightenment.
The individual is the ultimate unit of Faith. No priesthood or organization exists. All teaching is handed down orally in accordance with Vinaii's prohibition. Each Faithful prays toward Earth as the center-place of human devotion and the site where salvation was accomplished. All Faithful are sober, following Vinaii's own example.
Many Faithful incorporate practices from old Earth religion into their personal Faith — this is not considered syncretism so much as the retrieval of what was always already present. The Faithful hold that all genuine religion has always pointed to The One.
Vinaii Roshi is the son of criminals exiled from Earth during the Zero Day Accords. He was born on Europa in SY 28 and was quickly orphaned under circumstances unrecorded. He professed Buddhist beliefs through most of his life and worked as a hard laborer. He was largely illiterate.
The vast majority of Faithful exist in a loosely organized, non-hierarchical community with no priesthood or authority beyond the Gurus. At least one known sect exists:
The Army of Eastern Kamijing practices a syncretic religion largely based on Faith that also embraces elements of Architecture — particularly the spiritual experiences of the early Makers and adherents on Kamijing. While not particularly dogmatic, each AEK member is expected to practice this faith. Externally, it takes strong inspiration from ancient Shinto practice and represents in some ways a return to the Buddhism from which Faith was originally founded.
This form, known as Eastern Faith, takes place primarily in private. Each devotee constructs a traditional Shinto shrine understood as a dwelling place of The One, called here by the Asiatic term Ichkami — meaning "one spirit." Practices include burning incense, prayers, and meditation.
Regarding Architecture: Some militant Faithful identify The One with Architecture's concept of the Source, and criticize adherents for teaching a "plurality of gods" and worshipping a "lesser god." Architectural adherents respond that the Architect includes the Source but must voluntarily take on limitations to be comprehensible to humanity. The two traditions maintain respectful theological tension without resolution during the First Trilogy Era.
Regarding Terran Humanism: Vinaii himself repudiated Terran Humanism as entirely blasphemous. The Faithful consider the divinization of humanity in the absence of The One to be the most fundamental category error possible. Faith and Terran Humanism hold each other in firm opposition.
Regarding all Old Earth religion: Vinaii taught that all genuine religion has always pointed to The One — and that what differs between traditions is largely a matter of progressive revelation and the distortions of human institutions. The Faithful are notably non-exclusionary toward the origins of other traditions while being sharply critical of their institutional forms.