A character origin problem.

So I recently watched The Rite (fantastic movie), and ever since I've wanted to make an exorcist/priest character. I have the name Father Fury, and he's going to be a Fire/Time Controller.

Now here's the issue. God is a touchy subject on all fronts. I can make him Natural Origin, or Magic Origin.

Natural origin imples that God is natural, and that rubbed a few of my friends the wrong way as "religion isn't technically of a natural origin."

Magic origin will likely result in people going "OMG GOD ISN'T MAGIC."

What would you do?

Magic.

He gets his powers from the god he worships, and obviously they aren't available to everyone like a weapon would be. Otherwise, every single priest in the world would be super powerful. So I can't see it as being natural.

I'd go with magic.

A God who's allowing his devoutest followers to create flames out of nowhere and bend the flow of time is magic. He's obviously not a direct translation of the deity that real life Christians believe in, but a superhero universe translation of the same being.

If the power is granted by an external entity and can't be explained by science, that makes the character of a Magical origin. If he had unlocked some hidden human potential through meditation and communion then it would be Natural. Neither case declares anything about anyone's God, only about the character.

I'd place that character as Magic origin as well, for the same reasons. I have a Dual Blades/Fiery Aura Scrapper that, while I haven't played that character in a long time and she's sitting somewhere in the mid-20's, is essentially a holy warrior.

An older version of the Bible attests that magic is God's medium, and he doesn't like people sippin on his Kool-aid. This left the occult practitioners a lot of wiggle room, leading church officials to an all out ban under the idea that magic is "The Devil's work." This effectively severed faith in the pagan religions.

In my mind, God is magic, and it's as simple as that.

Hope this helps.

Make him Technology based. That ought to confuse people.

Actually, if "God" (with a capital g) exists as part of our natural universe, he might well fall under the Arthur C. Clarke quote,

"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."

Speaking things into being? Animating clay figures? Turning towns to ash and people to salt?

Sounds a lot like magic to me.

Addendum:

Judges 1: 19 -
And the lord was with Judah; and he drave out the inhabitants of the mountain; but could not drive out the inhabitants of the valley, because they had chariots of iron.

Iron vulnerability? He's not just magic, he's a fey creature.

I personally would go with magic.

However an argument can be made for either origin by use of Thaumaturgy A.K.A wonderworking (basically how the Saints performed their miracles). Originally the word held no magical connotations, but gained such meaning during the Renaissance.

In the end though it is your character, so choose the one you are most comfortable/happy with.

Touching on a religious concept does need to be done with some care -- there's a fine line between a cool concept and one that some others might find objectionable or even hateful.

Short of the generic demons and angels we see everywhere (I'd consider those a common-use mythological theme, and not specific to any one religion) if one is using specific and identifiable religious tenets, quoting or using real-world religious writings, identifying the character as a member of an actual, real-world, religious group or sect, or actively proselytizing as if one were one, then I'd suggest some extra care should be taken. Sketching out the concept and running it by some close friends for comment sounds reasonable to me.

Others might, but myself, I would not create a parody character with a religious background.

If my character were prone to proselytizing, I would make an OOC statement making clear it's just RP before doing so, and even then would confine that to infrequent RP situations.

If you decide to go with a strongly religious character, one way that might be cool is to invent a religion of your own out of whole cloth. You gain extra creative freedom and lose most of the potential offensiveness. It's an opportunity to let your inner writer create interesting background and history, along with a variety of supporting off-scene characters and events. It's hard work too, but can be creatively rewarding.

I've had one religious character in CoH, and from a prominent real-world religion. This was probably my most non-normal character of all, though the character wouldn't strike one as being a religious construct on meeting or casual interaction. Her origin and source of her power is her religion and deity, but I created a background for her that keeps the details secreted away. The part of the RP of the character I enjoyed most was being subtle about her religiosity; there were hints and clues that others would pick up on, and leave that bit of wondering behind, but nothing obvious others could pick up on. She was flawed and imperfect, and her religiosity was bound up in that. Her powers were sourced from the divine, as in the D&D divine magic sense, and key to her characterization were the strict limitations she had on how she could use them. A fun character, but difficult to play at times, and I'm sure I goofed it up now and then.

It's well worth it to use religion as a creative source for characterizations, and I see no reason why it cannot be done with both respect and imagination.

Use whatever Origin you wanna.

After watching the TV Show Supernatural, I remembered that they used spells to summon Demons, Angel, Four Horsemen, etc... It just seems to fit that when dealing with God Like abilities Magic is the best choice for a origin.

Eh, you could make a case for either. If he's a God, then it's not really technically 'magical' because the powers are inherit in him. A god might be the conduit, or deity who blesses others, and that would be 'magic' to them, but a god would, I think, understand the powers they wield and that they created. So he could just as very well be natural, as his abilities *are* natural *to him* while being magical to everyone else.

Edit: You could take a step further and ask yourself what sort of enhancements fit you more thematically, or what kind of missions you see yourself doing. Personally, a God character feels like it would fit better thematically in magic based missions fighting off the occult wizards of the damned or stopping some giant magical mystical spell of death than, say, stopping the Council from exporting a weapons shipment or setting up a tactical nuke that blows up all our precious Kheldians.

some say magic is just science with a different name....

old time magic was just things people made up before they had science to explain things.
So make him science origen!

I don't think it's blasphemous to call G-d "magic," in the context of the game. But regardless of your feelings about the Magic origin, it seems pretty clear that divine inspiration is not covered under Natural (unless the concept is maybe that the character only believes he's divinely empowered.)

I would go with magic.

It makes more sense than any of the other options.

The_Larker's suggestion of making him a mutant may have some interesting rp venues too.


My thought here is simple, if it is not in the natural world and can't be explained and replicated, then it belongs to a supernatural origin aka magic

Use any that you like, don't be hamstrung by a preset notion of an origin.

Magic is the most obvious and like the saying, "A wizard did it!", an easy one to fit to anything.

Natural could work too if the person is simply a conduit, perhaps raised and trained for the task, maybe just chosen or just born that way (an angel perhaps or half), and while the origin of the power is beyond the normal ken, they might not be.

Mutant can work for the same reason as magic, only it is a quirk in his make up that allows him to channel the powers of some otherworldly being. Or he could even be a mutant in so much as he is a demon that channels the power of God. Who knows?

Science? Sure, perhaps they imbibe some alchemical mixture or are altered by some form of energy on a cellular level. Anything is possible.

Technology seems a stretch but perhaps it refers to the use of devices. The nature of the items could be anything, but in the end a tool is still a tool.

Really just about any origin can be used for any character concept if you think about it. Just go with the idea you like best.

It's your character, so make it whatever you want. But I'd definitely go with "magic."

interesting problem let us know which you finally choose and why