Intermission XI
Within St. Rona Basilica in the holy city of Laval, Archbishop Beck was pacing back and forth in his office. The bishop had a troubled look on his face.
Beck was a controlling man and needed things to be a certain way to maintain that sense of control. Otherwise, he becomes a ball of anxiety like he is now.
His plans, which he had been painstakingly setting up for years, were now unraveling before his very eyes.
Everything was going wrong.
He had set out years ago to position himself as the next Speaker of Light within the church. He made alliances and countless deals with other high-ranking church members. Through that process, he created the largest unified faction within the church. The “Beck'' faction was the most powerful of the church factions and had enough sway to decide the next leader.
However, there was still no end to the tension between the various sects within his faction. He had to apply a very delicate hand and mediate between the different groups to keep them cooperative with each other. The most troublesome were the ultraconservative members of his faction.
They were hard to please and keep in line with others in his faction. They would disapprove of any little change within the church, which caused them to butt heads constantly with the more free-thinking and liberal members. The only way Beck could garner any of their support was to promise a rollback on some of the policies of the former Speaker of Light, Sheridan. Which he ultimately agreed to.
Beck personally would have cut those members of the church out of his faction if he could, but the support of the ultraconservative members would lead to the additional support of many other high-ranking and more agreeable members. The idea was, that if Beck could get those stubborn members to agree to something and get behind him, he could be a unifying force for the church.
Much of the support he got came from the idea of unity. Everyone in the church got a sense of troubled times ahead, and many desired a more united church to face those problems. Senior priests and bishops were all willing to compromise some of their beliefs to a degree if it meant cooperation in dealing with the more pressing issues facing the Church of Light.