Basic Trope: The rules of a (usually orthopraxic
) religion present new and interesting challenges in a Science Fiction or other Speculative Fiction setting.
- Straight:
- The Church of Crystal Dragon Jesus requires that all of its buildings face the true North, else prayers won't get to The Powers That Be. Meanwhile, Alice and Bob are drifting through space on a Generation Ship after Earth is no longer habitable, where there is no North.
- The Church requires its members to swim in the temple's sacred pool in order to become initiated, or to take a ritual bath in it to purify themselves before worship. Aerith, meanwhile, is an alien whose chemical makeup is such that even touching water will lead to painful death.
- A Ridiculously Human Robot is confused as to whether or not it has a soul.
- Exaggerated: Alice and Bob can't do anything: all the available food on board is forbidden to them, Designer Babies are created in Uterine Replicators, people on board regularly engage in orgies and/or other forms of non-procreative sex (also forbidden to Alice and Bob), and even non-religious programming on TV is forbidden to them. On top of them not having a place to pray and worship.
- Downplayed: Alice and Bob practice a religion (such as Wicca) that places a heavy emphasis on the changing seasons...but they live near the equator, where seasonal changes are so subtle they tend to go unnoticed by a lot of people.
- Justified: The church was founded centuries before space travel or the existence of aliens were even ideas.
- Inverted:
- If anything, it becomes easier to practice their faith.
- The religion was devised as a joke, and its initiation ceremony requires members to peel off their skins and wear them inside out... which eventually becomes possible - for certain definitions of "skins" - among extraterrestrial beings who take the religion seriously.
- God is proven to be real. This makes it harder for Alice and Bob to preach their lack of faith.
- Subverted: Alice and Bob live on a manmade space colony at one of the LaGrange points, that has a stable orbit and magnetic field, and thus a North to orient their church towards.
- Double Subverted: Something goes awry, and the colony is flung off into space, with no more North to speak of.
- Parodied: The gospel specifically mentions that all members of the faith must visit Jordan's Old-Fashioned Hot Dog Stand twice a week and order their Cranberry Sauce Delight dog with a side of fries or risk being offered as a Human Sacrifice. Meanwhile, Alice and Bob only have access to a Jordan's Home-Style Hot Dog Stand.
- Zig Zagged: Some aspects of Alice and Bob's religion are workable, some are not.
- Averted:
- Alice and Bob are Secular Heroes.
- The religion has made a concession to these issues, or there's a loophole somewhere.
- Enforced: ???
- Lampshaded: "Does your spaceship have a North? We can only pray facing North."
- Invoked: Earth is no longer habitable thanks to centuries of heavy pollution, so those who are still alive board a spaceship heading to a habitable planet... but thanks to a little thing called The Laws of Physics, the journey is going to take decades, or even centuries.
- Exploited: The Church of Crystal Dragon Jesus creates its own theocratic space colony, with a means to worship (as they deem) properly.
- Defied:
- The Church of Crystal Dragon Jesus changes the rules, or makes a concession for space colonies.
- The chaplain defines the bow as "North," as it was the top of the ship as it was being launched and North is the topmost part of the Earth.
- Aerith is allowed to cleanse herself with holy oils rather than bathing in what is, to her, a deadly toxin.
- Discussed:
- "Of course you do, Gamma-7. If you scan that Mankind constitutes the Children of God, then logically, Machinekind constitutes the Children of Man, and by extension, the Grandchildren of God. And what parent doesn't want grandkids?"
- "If you define North as 'where the compass points,' pray facing the radiation screen core. If you define North as 'the topmost place on Earth,' pray facing the bow."
- "Centrifugal Gravity? Hm, I'd say that North would be roughly analogous to Hubwards."
- Conversed: ???
All inscriptions of the trope name Fantastic Religious Weirdness must be framed in ivy.
