Kelx

Overview

Kelx refers both to a religious faith and to an individual ark (congregation) of that faith. A dictionary entry (4th ed., A.R. 3000) defines it in both senses. The name is a contraction of the Orth term "Ganakelux," meaning "Triangle Place," reflecting the prominence of triangles in its iconography. Adherents are called Kedevs, and clergy are called magisters.

Purpose and Structure

Accounts describe a triadic narrative at the heart of the faith: the Condemned Man (a creative but flawed principle), the Magistrate (judgment and goodness), and the Innocent (redeeming inspiration). The world people live in is said to be narrated, serially, by the Condemned Man to the Magistrate, who will one day render a final judgment. Believers are urged to improve the world so that, when their deeds are "told," they help tip that judgment toward continued life. The faith is portrayed as fissured into sects and schisms; some descriptions characterize it as under the heel of other faiths and inclined to apocalyptic rhetoric.

Practices

• Services observed in one ark were led by a ship-borne magister who preached and then interviewed attendees one by one, asking what each had recently done to make the world better.
• Preaching can emphasize that the final judgment is near at hand, with vivid appeals to personal responsibility.
• Kelx services are described as brief and intense rather than lengthy, contrasted with those of the Bazians.
• In at least one northern port, a local Kelx has organized charitable medical care through a clinic that treated an injured traveler brought in by soldiers.

Known Members/Associations

• Magister Sark led services for a small ark aboard a passenger ship, ministering to sailors and fishermen.
• Named Kedevs include Alwash and Malter (shipboard attendees who engaged newcomers).
• The faith is distinct from that of Ganelial Crade, as noted by observers.

Recent Activity

• Aboard a passenger ship, a Kelx magister delivered a sermon asserting that the Magistrate had been sighted in the heavens and that the Warden of Heaven had been cast out; the speaker used these claims to exhort moral action. Listeners debated whether to take such statements literally. See also Warden of Heaven for the referenced movement.
• Separately, in a northern coastal port previously reached after a mountain pass, soldiers took an injured migrant to a Kelx-run charity clinic, indicating an active public-facing presence.