The Rimebound Saints
The Communion of the Kept · the Doctrine of Sainthood
The Rimebound Saints are those whom the church holds to be certainly kept in the The White Horizon — “bound forever into the Rime,” incorrupt and glorified — and venerates as friends, models, and intercessors. This page sets out the doctrine of sainthood; for the persons, see the Saints Index.
What a Saint Is
A Rimebound Saint is one in whom the virtues were perfected and who is now “kept” beyond all doubt — “bound into the unmelting drift of the Horizon.” All the truly kept are saints in the broad sense (the “hidden” saints), but the Rimebound Saints properly so called are those the church has formally recognized (see Frostmarking the Saints (Canonization)).
Veneration, Not Worship
The central rule: Frostians venerate but never worship the saints. Worship (the awe-and-delight of the Savor) belongs to the Cold alone. The saints are honored as the Cold’s masterpieces and asked to keep us in their prayers before the Cold — as one might ask a still-living friend to pray. The Reformed honor the saints as examples but reject prayer to them.
The Marks of a Saint
- Heroic virtue — a life of conspicuous Stillness, Clarity, and Keeping.
- The Whitening of the martyrs — those who died for the faith are saints by their very martyrdom (see Saint Stefan, Corin the Coldstone).
- Incorruption — the undecayed body is the classic sign: an unmelted corpse is held a pledge in the flesh of the Reforging. The incorrupt relics of saints are treasured above all artifact-relics (see Relics of the Cold).
- Cold-signs (miracles) — keepings worked through their intercession.
The Communion of the Kept
Frostians confess (in the Creed) the communion of the saints: that the kept on earth (the “wayfaring Drift”), the kept being re-frozen in The Slush (the “cooling Drift”), and the kept in the The White Horizon (the “kept Drift”) are one fellowship, able to keep one another in prayer across the threshold of death. Thus the living ask the saints’ prayers, and pray for the souls in the Slush.
The Hierarchy of Honor
Greatest of all is Wenna Frost, the Ever-Snow, honored above every created being; then the The Frostborne Twelve and the apostles; then the martyrs, the doctors (like Saint Hagal and Saint Cael of Frosthold), the confessors, and the holy virgins and widows.