Hello and welcome. This sermon is entitled "The Dragon, the Hyena and the Crow". It is about balance, one of the four truths our faith believes in.

There are many misconceptions about balance and how to keep it. First of all, balance is not a state between good and evil, as some people think. Good and bad, good and evil are sapient made categories largely dependent on morally and cultural conventions.  If everything is fine, the sun is shining, your bank account is full, it doesn't mean you have a problem. It doesn't mean you need something bad in your life to keep the balance. No, balance simply describes a state of stability. You could as well, per convention, define a state in balance as good and a state out of balance as evil, in most cases this would make more sense than some of our morally definitions.

What you have to know is that there are different kind of balances. If a system always return in it's original state after being disturbed, we call this a stable balance. It is like a rock in a small and deep valley - you can move it to the left and right, but it will always return to the position at the bottom of the valley. In contrary to that, there are also labile balances. A rock on a hill. It remains where it is as long as nothing happens, but a stronger disturbance like a storm may move it from its position and it will roll down.

Real life of course doesn't tend to the extremes. The balances we know are rather like a mixture between the two mentioned - a rock on top of a hill lying in a dell. Stable against smaller influences, but never the less a strong distortion could push it over the border and make it roll down, destroying the stability of the system forever.

We druids are often asked why Ateraan can't take for itself. Everything is in balance, so there's nothing to do. But those semi stable balances make the difference. A single barren spot in the forest is no big problem, but we have to avoid the extremes. Most of you will know the story of Teciann. The sapients of Teciann kept exploiting their planet, they even used the powers of their world for their own purposes, so they pushed Teciann over a point of no return, the rock started rolling from the hill and couldn't stop anymore. The planet was that weakened that creatures from another plane could intrude and take over, destroying  what was not destroyed yet. We know the end, the destruction of a while planet with millions of dead.

You may say, well, we on Ateraan are not that stupid. Most people care for replanting, and our technology is not that advanced that it can really harm nature. But be careful. The technological exploitation was not the main problem of Teciann.

We druids use the example of Teciann to teach our new hopefuls how important our tenet of focus is. and indeed, the sapients of teciann, especially their druids, loosing focus, was the issue which finally lead to its destruction. They did care more for their internal political and religious conflicts, weakened the planet more instead of protecting it from the real enemy.

Most people thing that can't happen here. We are too reasonable. We won't let it come that far. But some events in the near past give me some doubts.

If I take a look at the original topic of this sermon - balance - it is not only about natural balance, we have a balance in our daily social and political life, too. We all have the requirement that we are treated fairly and just by others. We don't want to be insulted or attacked by others. We want people to respect our fealty, our faith and our beliefs. Life is not perfect, but in most cases it is in balance somehow. Someone steals your magic boots, the thief is punished by justice. Someone insults your faith, there will be exchanged some harsh words and in most cases it ends with an apology. In most cases this works, in others it doesn't.

This is not really a problem. Our world is not perfect, and some things don't work as they should. The problem occurs if those unresolved conflicts grow bigger and bigger. They enter a spiral of escalation. The conflict between single people spread to their faiths and their cities, the fragile social balance is pushed over the edge and suddenly you have a war between the faiths, between north and south.

And those big conflicts can really bring us into more trouble than we would expect. There are some signs that there is a bigger threat upcoming. Something for which we will need our whole power, the help of everyone, regardless if norden or suden, if Dahkoarim, Waylumi, Nature devoted or faithless. We cannot afford wasting our powers in childish local conflicts, even yet as the danger seems far away. We have to prepare. Each conflict weakens us.

So ask yourself, is it really worth it? You might have the feeling some time that you were treated wrongly. If this can be solved with a small dispute which stays under control, fine. But you have to ask yourself if you respect the principle of proportionality. Is it worth to draw your faith into this conflict? Your city? It is your responsibility to preserve the balance, for the sake of Ateraan.

Imagine a dragon and a hyena, sleeping in their places. Suddenly a crow fly in in each place and starts to pick at the feet of the animals. What do you think they will do? The Hyena probably will kill the crow. The dragon maybe would look curiously, would shoo the crow, but wouldn't bother to leave his resting place. And this is not because he is weaker than the hyena, it's because he is stronger.

There is no honour or strength in fighting back without considering the consequences. Hate is just a symptom of fear, and fear is weakness. Keep your disputes local, keep the balance, for our all planet, the chosen planet of all our deities and leaders.