#I mean for Felix and Dimitri to know Rhea is one woman army

[randomnameless]

Searching through Nopes' datamine to find some stuff, I found this tidbit :

Nopes!Felix apparently knows Rhea is a stupidly powerful fighter?

Nopes AU : Catherine became pretty pissed that everyone wanted to "train" with Lady Rhea, she is her knight, if someone has to train with her lady liege, it's her!

But no, the Fraldarius brat keeps on asking her to "train", just like the King !

(Ingrid tries to talk to the Archbishop, since Flayn told her Lady Rhea knows a lot of stories and legends about Saint Seiros, but she is a bit intimidated, until she sees Felix fly past her after another "training" session).

And now, she asked Flayn'n'Seteth to plan a trip to Sreng, out of anywhere, to "fetch magic weapons" for their new Faerghan allies!

[kendrixtermina]

Uh, he does. He constantly refers to hell (or rather “the eternal flames”) and the afterlife, the souls of the fallen etc (same beliefs beliefs that Rodrigue and Felix also refer to at various points - Rodrigue says similar things about “facing the dead king”

Felix wants nothing to do witth it but if he’s recruited in GD he’ll say that he wants to averge Dimitri to appease his ghost after he dies, much like what Rodrigue and Dimitri himself say - Rodrigue, of course, was sort of a father figure to Dimitri after his own parents died.  )

Clearly much of what Dimitri refers to is just his survor’s guilt talking, if not something diagnosable, but how he interprets it and the particular shape it takes is still informed/influenced by the beliefs he was raised with.

He literally says “Begone heretic!” in the holy tomb scene and various characters note that he prayed a lot (after he dies in the GD route),  does so in many supports and also has this cute scene where he fondly speaks of the legends and how cool it is that Byleth is to get a divine revelation etc.

I take it you’re referring to that line in his goddess tower scene but what he’s saying there is more that he can’t imagine a benevolent godess that helps people (or, another possibility he gives, that people are too weak to make use of her help), he very much has a very “fire and brimstone” interpretation of faith with little room for forgivemeness for others OR himself

Or that’s how I read it, I suppose you could also interpret this as deism (gods exist but don’t interfere) but I don’t think that’s what he means.

One presumes that he switched to a more positive forgiving version after his redemption arc. I mean the place he rules is literally called the holy kingdom of Faerghus even if he didn’t believe at all he’d hardly have gotten his army to follow him.

Adrestia had been more secular and estranged from the Church for a while when Edelgard does her thing, of the Black Eagle students only Ferdinand iever menttions being a believer and he’s not even especially devout.

In any case he way saying that he doesn’t believe in a certain version of the godess he never says that he’s not religious at all (and again constantly refers to hell)

And regardless of wether or not he’s a believer he would have no reason to attack or bring down the church- what have they ever done to him that he knows of?  There’s a big difference in not believing in the church and wanting to bring them down. After all they’re just people who have a different opinion.

I mean I’m not religious that doesn’t mean I want to kill the pope or go in a church or mosque and shoot people - they’re not harming me in any way. But if someone said for example that because of their religion I can’t marry a woman or have contraceptives, or use relion to justify inequality? Then we have a problem.  And I still wouldn’t want to shoot them them since in a democracy there are nonviolent ways to change the government which isn’t really the case to the same extent in a medieval setting.

Edelgard’s not fighting the church cause they have a different opinion than her; Many supports and engage quotes make it pretty clear that she just wants them out of politics  (like in any modern country that isnt saudi arabia or the vatican) and has no intention to keep anyone from praying if they want to regardless of what she personally things of it.

She wants to fight them because they are basically a shadow government that is both repressive and grossly incompetent. They had been meddling with politics which she knows because until just a few generations ago when the southern church was dissolved, her own family was helping them do it.

Claude’s kinda guessed part of it because he’s smart and has an outside perspective but he doesn’t know it in detail and since Edelgard had already removed Rhea by the time he gets to be the leader, he doesn’t need to fight them, he basically installs Byleth (his good friend who is technically an Avatar of their deity) as a leader and gets it under his control by purely political means. And he too doesn’t want to stop anyone from praying if they want to he just wants to promote free thinking and intercultural exchange.

I find it kinda wack that Edelgard is the one to take down the church. I mean I don't have a problem with it but...... Didn't Dimitri say he doesn't believe In God. This just crossed ny mind....feel free to give me a vibe check