Although I am not all that much into conworlding, it is a thing I do sometimes do anyways, and my conlangs Ćwarmin, Bryatesle, Tatediem, Dairwueh and Barxaw all do occupy the same conworld.
Although the description may seem somewhat idealistic and utopian at the onset, there are some dark twists.
Bryatesle:Dairwueh::Greeks:Romans. That is, the Dairwueh empire basically has adopted a lot of Bryatesle customs, and Bryatesle is a respected language even up to high levels of the Dairwueh administration. The Bryatesle never had quite as centralized an empire, though, and thus not all Bryatesle colonies have been subsumed into the Dairwueh empire.
Tatediem:Dairwueh & Bryatesle~::Aramaic:Greeks & Romans. The Tatediem language is much less similar to either of Bryatesle or Dairwueh, but a large proportion of the empire's subjects in some areas speak Tatediem. However, Tatediem has been the main language of a competing empire, and rump states (the plural is intentional) of that empire still exist.
Barxaw:D,B,T::China:AG & R. Or maybe like the Indonesians. Distant enough that no direct interaction essentially happens. There is a vague awareness of each other's existence, but next to no actual contact.
The Ćwarmin are a bit less easy to categorize in such simple terms - in one way, they are like the Jews - a religious and ethnic minority dispersed in the empire. In another way, they are like Finnic and Turkic reindeer herders with regard to early Kievan Rus. After their displacement from their native lands (due to these lands being the source of unobtainium), they retain the traditions of how to use this unobtainium, but lack sources of it.
So, onto the religions! The Dairwueh empire is religious both centralized and somewhat decentralized; there are nine accepted religions, although these do not generally view themselves as religions, but rather as expressions of one religion. Monotheism has been a rather powerful force in the region for quite some time, and these nine all are monotheist, although some slight polytheist traces may be found in some of them. Their differences are comparable to the differences between pentecostal Christians, Shi'ite Muslims and Orthodox Sikhs. I will henceforth call them 'movements'.
Each movement has some form of hierarchy, and the top of the hierarchy has an ambassador in the vicinity of the capital of the empire. The movements generally do not compete for members, and only expect their own members to adhere to their customs. Each movement does prefer for its members to have access to a holy building of their own type, but if a town has several small groups represented, these may well build some kind of shared minority temple, often with little in ways of ostentatiously 'sectarian' traits. Shared services also occur, with liturgies agreed on by representatives of the involved movements. Tensions do appear in the process, but mostly are resolved peacefully.
Religion in the Dairwueh-Tatediem-Bryatesle world had less direct ties with power in the early days than in our world - kings' legitimacy were established in other ways. Religion grew from a grass-roots movement that criticized political organization but also formalized and ritualized superstitions and philosophy into what we would recognize as organized religion. The hierarchy that grew up around it soon mildened the political criticism, but did also gain secular recognition as valid points of view. Tensions between different groups were generally speaking pretty small, and the empire attempted to gain control over the movements by centralizing them, recognizing a set of them as valid, and using their support to get rid of more radical movements. Thus, the nine main movements were granted some religious autonomy but were also required to participate in the imperial ecumenism and accomodate the decisions taken by the imperial ecumenical council. This also lead to a growing influence in the spheres outside of the empire where these religions were practiced.
Within this community of movements, there is a lot of variety in beliefs and practices. You are expected to conform to the beliefs and practices of the movement into which you were born (or, in the case that your movement permits conversion to another movement, the one into which you have converted - usually, this is done by officials of high rank for political reasons, or by migrants or people who intermarry - something not permitted by all the movements). Outsiders - people who are not born into the system at all - may join some of the movements. Some of the movements will suggest that you join another movement unless there are no local options, and two of them don't accept any newcomers at all.
Slaves are mostly not considered members at all, but are seen as a kind of secondary-class adherent, whose movement should be the same as that of their owners. Kaildaper, Nukper and Stedbaper, Kindaper have special interfaces to the slavery system, as Kaildaper formally rejects slavery, Kindaper doesn't really accept non-born Kindapers as second-class adherents and Nukper's recent changes put them at odds with almost every other movement. A slave of a Stedbaper adherent is considered a full member, and may attain quite some status in that movement.
However, this collaboration also has its even darker sides - if you are a member of movement A, but you are preaching things considered heretical by that movement, all the other movements too are obligated to act against you - first, they need to rebuke you, then there is punitive measures taken, and finally you may end up executed or exiled. Some rather bizarre complications with regards to this has occurred, as will become apparent in further descriptions of these religions.
Some of these movements clearly are closely related as well:
- Kaildaper - founded by the fisherman/marine trader Reignom, whose role in the religion is similar to Muhammad in Islam but also in some ways to Jesus in Christianity. Like Muhammad, he wrote a fair share of scripture, and his teachings are emulated and developed by the members. There is a number of pretty odd mystical belief systems developed about Reignom's acts towards the end of his life.
- Bruogdaper - originated in areas close to Kaildaper's origins, and also recongizes Reignom as a saint and important prophet.
- Migdaper - similar to Migdaper and Kaildaper. All these three do some proselytism among people outside the nine religions, and there's some sort of internal competition between the three. Intermarriages between Migdaper and Bruogdaper adherents are common, and these three often share temples if their populations are small. In towns where one of them is predominant, members of the other two very well might dispense with participating in minority temples, and join the majority.
- Nukper - a very temple-and-ritual centered movement, in which a recent reform movement has caused some abrupt changes and problems.
- Kenoper - related to Nukper, but shares no holy texts or heroes. Somewhat more enamored with warfare, due to the constant raids from barbarians that plagued the area for several centuries
- Stedbaper, Lirbexper, Kindaper - three related movements that differ in a variety of ways - Stedbaper has a richly developed monastic and ritual life, Lirbexper's ritual life is very much framed in terms of battle against evil, and Kindaper has a caste system that permeates the movement very strongly. Lirbexper has the most developed philosophy of religion out of the various movements. The kindaper caste system also ranks members of other movements
- Tuxiper - in part, Tuxiper is more closely related to the outsider 'Ćwaríper' than to any of the eight other movements. A great part of its lore deals with discussions with spirits about different issues, a lot of which is documented in a confusing and rather under-specified bunch of documents, the Mexdron tikil; these documents just list what was said, and who participated in each discussion. Who said what is never specified, which leads to interesting variations in interpretation. Some of the spirits are known to be jokers, liars or downright malevolent, all are known to drive their own interests, and some even lie about their identity. The shamans do not interact with the spirits any longer, or very seldom, due to their doubt about the spirits' intentions.
And finally, outside of the system but given a separate status:
- Ćwaríper - the religion of the Ćwarmin minority. A shamanistic religion with a rich ritual based on the acquisition of unobtainium, and its use for magic. This ritual is maintained and kept secret (by means of 'misleading' rituals as well as 'real' rituals) for the day when the Ćwarmin again will regain access to lands with unobtainium. A smaller corpus of discussions with spirits than that present in Tuxiper also exists, but since a lot of it deals with aspects of unobtainium, it is not in great use at the time.
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