She is safety; she is refuge; she is protection. She is the enfolding embrace of night, in all its gentleness.
Her name is Stella.
She doesn't remember where she came from, but she can feel that someone needs her. More than one someone. A lot of someones, actually. Some of them are outside her domain, but that doesn't matter, not when she can fix things for the ones that are.
She reaches out to help, to heal, to safeguard.
You would object if I did something obviously bad, right? I want you to be honest with me, not just rubber-stamp whatever I say.
"Um, of course?" She looks a bit surprised for a moment. "I trust you not to smite me for talking back, so of course I'm gonna speak up if you have a bad idea. Also just... part of loving people is wanting them to be the best them they can be, and that means calling them out — gently, ideally — if they make a mistake."
"Gladly, Goddess."
She posts the prioritization statement on the website, and then sends quiet-wings a quick check-in.
Hey there. How's the afternoon going so far?
Better than it could be.
Selling miracles, huh? Guess there goes Stella's claim to the moral high ground. Invest in goddess stocks today. Preparing for the Divine IPO, valued at $AllTheMoney. Seriously, what are you people thinking?
We're thinking that we have to engage with the existing economy, because we don't have enough social infrastructure that we can afford to break it, and we need services we can purchase through it. Selling a few miracles that Stella rates morally neutral — due note that we retained her right to refuse any miracle request for any reason, and thus she won't grant anything that goes against her principles and values — pays for utilities at Temple facilities, buys land to build free or cheap housing for people, commissions the design of new material objects for Stella to conjure without copyright worries, pays the authors of media Stella's already conjuring, buys land to build soup kitchens or safe injection sites, and more. Money hires accountants to keep the government from finding ways to declare our donations illegal. If you have a feasible idea for how to pay for all those needs without selling miracles, we would sincerely love to hear it. We don't want to do it this way, but the world runs on incentives, and this is the best idea we have.
Sorry if I got a bit sharp, there. Honestly not a fan of the plan, but I can't think of a better way of engaging with the existing economy.
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