Some people have been asking me: why art?  What's the point?  What's so Good about it?

Now, if you don't like art, that's fine.  Not every good thing is everybody's cup of tea!  You shouldn't feel bad about it if on reflection you'd rather be a Sarenrite and focus on the central features of Good and skip the art part - the Good gods aren't rivals, they're friends!  We want the best for you, and if the best for you is somebody straightforward like Sarenrae or somebody practical like Erastil or somebody really intense like Iomedae, or even one of the lesser-known empyreal lords on that list at the desk over there whose niche thing you really resonate with, then that's what we want for you.

But if you do like art, and you're not sure why you like it, not sure why Shelyn likes it, not sure whether you feel really allowed to like it?  This one's for you.

Art is gentle.  A mistake on the battlefield costs lives; one on the canvas costs only paint. If you are in a fragile state, I know many of you are, and don't know what would be wicked and what would be decent, please don't underrate the value of moving cautiously - you don't have to martyr yourself in the streets, and in fact shouldn't.  While you're still new to Goodness, you know what helps?  Safe experiments with stories.  Read a novel!  Are the characters in it following their consciences or their self-interest?  You can think about it all day in the safety of your own room.  Look at the murals Songbird Gabriel has in progress all over this building while they're drying and waiting for a new layer.  What do you see in the Eternal Rose's eyes, in those paintings?  What is she shown doing, why might she be doing it?  You can contemplate that here as long as you need to, and you won't hurt a soul while you're thinking about it.

Art is an amazing way to make friends.  I think Cheliax has forgotten how having friends works, in these years where every tendency toward it was made dangerous and painful.  I think a lot of us believe that friendship is a childish crutch.  But it's not - the love between friends is one of the best ways to get in touch with your conscience.  Once you have a friend you have a glimpse of how much everyone waiting for you to come home to the Upper Planes feels about you, and how you should strive to act toward everyone you meet.  And the Infernal regime did its very best to make us forget how to befriend people, to make us flinch away from it - but just you try learning the harmony part to your favorite song and singing it with someone new holding down the melody line!  The Infernal nervousness can still crumble aside and let you look across your sewing circle to see what your neighbor has done with her split-stitch.  You are not too old to make friends, today, with someone who has all the right opinions about the last opera you saw.  After the sermon we've got a few discussion group sign-up sheets on the walls.  If you don't recognize any of the titles, give one you do to Cecília, over there, and she'll help you start your own club to meet people with your tastes.

Art is beautiful!  Do not discount this!  Imagine meeting your eternity and finding yourself in a place devoid of beauty - you would know immediately it was the desolate Boneyard, the flames of Avernus, or the crawling Abyss.  A sterile paradise without light and color is unrecognizable as paradise.  Why, then, would we fail to make our mortal lives that little bit more paradisical?  Perhaps you haven't the skill to draw on your walls at home like Songbird Gabriel does here, or perhaps you rent an apartment and the walls aren't yours; I know it's easy to be shy of trying to beautify what's around you before you have practiced enough to bring a vision to life - but you can pick flowers to bring home.  You can wear your loveliest clothes that make you feel the most at home in your skin, for any or no occasion at all.  You can admire someone's whittling or their weaving, especially at the art classes you can sign up for over there, and maybe you will find that they've got a hundred just like it cluttering their shelves and will part with it for the smile on your face alone!  Braid your hair!  Hum on your way to work!  Turn your handwriting into calligraphy!  Make your life beautiful enough that you can recognize it as paradise!

Does this all sound kind of small and silly?  It isn't.  I promise you, it isn't.  From these grains of sand great castles are built.  But if you have a taste for the dramatic - I certainly do -

Was it not art that spurred Pezzack out of the control of the Thrunes?  Was it not art that spread whispers of the outside world through a network of smugglers that crisscrossed Cheliax and ushered, in turn, people in danger out beyond its borders, some of whom have now come home to the safety of our new Queen's regime?  Was it not art when Creation itself was forged out of nothingness, that now we have stars and sunflowers and seashells and snowflakes?  Are songs not spells?  The hand that can render a landscape can direct a Teleport.  The hand that can render a half-glimpsed monster can call the best-prepared adventurers.  The hand that can render a portrait can fill our new and true history books.  Picture the wreckage of the war cleared away and arches and glass rising to touch the sky!  Picture the sketches of little children learning to hold their chalk, held up to show off, unafraid of the lash for the unpracticed lines!  Picture the curtain rising to reveal a Cheliax that sparkles with hope!

Lady Shelyn, bless us all with your inspiration, that we may paint the world in Your praises!