Sune

Life

Face of a red-haired, ivory-skinned beautiful woman

Beauty is more than skin deep, say the Sunites; it issues from the core of one's being and shows one's fair (or foul) face to the world. The followers of Sune are believers in romance, true love winning over all, and following one's heart to one's true destination. Fated matches, impossible loves, and ugly ducklings becoming swans are all part of the teaching of Sune.   Novice Sunites receive the following charge: "Love none more than yourself save Sune, and lose yourself in love of the Lady Firehair. Perform a loving act every day, and seek to awaken love in someone new each day. Respond to love at least once in a day.   "Encourage beauty wherever you find it. Acquire beautiful items of all sorts, and encourage, sponsor, and protect the artists who produce such things whenever and wherever you find them.   "Keep your own body as comely as possible and as attractively displayed as situations warrant. Let hairstyle and clothing best suit your personal appearance, striving to stir and delight others who look upon you. Moreover, hide not away, but always seek to present yourself to those around you in a pleasing variety of garbs and activities so as to move them with love and desire.   "Love those that respond to your beauty and all beauty, and let warm friendship and admiration flower where love cannot or dare not."

Greengrass is celebrated by Sunites with a great deal of outdoor frolicking, and Midsummer Night with night-long flirtatious chases through forests and parks, but local priesthoods can set the times of other celebrations to their own pleasure, as long as at least one Grand Revel befalls each month and at least one Feast of Love is celebrated in every tenday.   A Grand Revel is a dusk-to-dawn party to which outsiders are invited, dancing and minstrelsy dominate, and those of the faith seek to attract converts with fun and the exhibition of a few of a temple's or shrine's beautiful art objects or magical treasures. A Feast of Love is a more intimate, quiet affair, open only to the faithful, who lie on couches and indulge in the gentle sipping of liqueurs and nibbling at subtly flavored bitelets (as savory hors d'oeuvres are called in the Realms) and sweet pastries while lone dancers perform. These dances are interspersed with readings of romantic verse and prose and lays of love sung by skilled minstrels. Such rituals always break up into private gatherings, though bards are always on hand to relate tales of courtly love or mysteries of Faerun for those who do not feel like socializing more privately.   Sunites also offer personal prayers to Sune, always while dressed in beautiful ritual garments, standing in a pool or bath, and looking into a mirror lit only by natural light or candles. Those seeking guidance in life, entry into the faith, or atonement indulge in a night-long Candle Vigil. Sune sends guidance to them by visions visible in the mirror—often by altering the reflection of the worshiper in some way.

Day-to-Day Activities

Sunites are aesthetes and hedonists, who actively seek out pleasure and beauty in all things. The pursuit of aesthetic enjoyment is their life. Sunite clergy buy beautiful items of art, sculpture, and handiwork whenever they find it, sponsoring good artists where necessary and overpaying for such items so as to drive prices up, create more demand, and so increase the supply of things of beauty. This is to be done as often as funds afford and subtlety permits, and in disguise if need be.   Whenever Sunite clergy must perform dirty tasks, the use of disguise is encouraged to protect the body as well as to conceal identity. The devout priest always hires or supports adventurers and others to destroy beings who vandalize beautiful creations.   All clergy of Sune also strive to create beauty in a personal way, preferably as a creator of static fine art (blown-glass ornaments, paintings, or tapestries are all fashionable), but as a dancer if one fails at all else. When one of them gains expertise in crafting things of beauty, she or he is obliged to pass on such learning by training others and turning away no one who shows genuine promise. Any moneys made through such training should be given to the church to further the growth of beauty and love everywhere.   Although Sunite clergy can rebuff unwanted advances, they should strive to build friendships and romantic feelings between themselves and others and in general wherever they go so that love may prosper everywhere in the Realms. As the lonely are in most need of such things (and the most likely to join in love of the Lady Firehair), they should be sought out by diligent clergy for friendship. Everyone, no matter how homely or disparate in faith from the path of the Lady, should be assisted by gifts of clothing, hair styling, cosmetics, and lessons in deportment, dancing, and manners to so as make themselves as beautiful as possible.  

Priestly Vestments

Sunites are not bashful about their bodies. The standard ceremonial garb of Sunite priests is monastic robes for men and habits for women, both cut to show off the figure of the wearer and dyed a deep crimson. Hair is normally worn long and allowed to fall free during rituals. At other times, priestesses wear attractive wimples with v-shaped crown pieces, and priests bind their tresses back with crimson scarves. While red hair is considered touched by the goddess, all shades of hair and skin are welcome, provided they are unmarred and lovely.   Aside from her face, other, less-common symbols of Sune are a winking eye (often seen as an animated illusion on the doors of Sunite temples) or a pair of golden parted female lips with the tip of a vivid ruby-red tongue just visible between them, slyly touching the upper lip.    

Adventuring Garb

At light-hearted social functions, members of the clergy often wear the lips of the goddess painted on a shoulder or their midriffs. At such times, they don garments cut away to display the badge of the goddess. When fighting or adventuring, clerics of Sune prefer as much protection (magical and otherwise) as they can afford. It is not that they are cowards, but they want desperately to avoid scars or even the need for magical healing. Sunite clergy often wear oversized, ornate, heavily padded full body armor (such as plate mail or plate armor, or even scale mail or chain mail with full coifs, helmets, and shields) designed to afford the body maximum protection against visible marring. Often such armor is fluted, polished mirror-bright, or otherwise adorned so as to be as pleasing to the eye as possible.