Ok, I know the Church hates 'the Supernatural', but whenever something specific is mentioned, they always specify casters and other races.

Are Ki powers and Ki Dominions 'Supernatural', within the context of Gaia? I mean, I know by our standards they are, but EVERYONE develops some level of Martial Knowledge, regardless of class. Most never learn use of Ki, but anyone potentially can. And the fluff description of what Ki is says everyone possesses it.

So in that context, does the Church view it as Supernatural?

If the answer is 'Yes' can anyone point me to a page reference? I got to thinking about this when I read about the Ki Technique tree in DE that exemplifies the spirit of Gabriel. Which made me think there would be schools teaching it... and then I was like, wait, would they?

It depends on what abilities with Ki you are using. If your using Ki to create a fireball, then yes the church would consider that supernatural and hunt you down. Since normal people can't distinguish the difference between Ki and other supernatural abilities, many of them will be considered as such. However, using Ki to do things like extra high jumps, slicing through a stone pillar, are more accepted as normal people can believe this is entirely due to training and not something supernatural, where as flying would be. Basically its all about interpretation, if it could be considered the work of a wizard, then it's treated as such, does not matter if you're using Ki to the church, what you're doing is blatantly above what is considered attainable through pure skill alone.

Tywyll said:

The entire point of the church is that they are a bunch of hypocrites. Ki is supernatural to them unless it is being used by their own people. Also it is only supernatural if it can't just be attributed to training. As Malekai said, anything with an overt display(a rose of energy guarding you) is supernatural, anything where it could just be you being skilled is fine(weight elimination, presence extrusion, multiple defense techniques).

For the page reference: At page 254 of the Gaia-Book, it is mentioned, that the church "hates" supernatural and that "wizards and summoner" especially evil. So it must exist other "evil supernatural" abilities. At Page 288 of the same book, under the "Limitation" of the Saint-Advantage it is written: "The character must have some sort of Supernatural Ability or have developed Ki Abilities to be able to take this advantage", so the church must consider Ki as supernatural and therefore evil.

For the argument "everyone could learn Ki": Yes, everyone could, if you would only need MK. But you need also time and some sort of will, to do it. In my campaign, everyone who has a Gnosis of 10 or higher has the learning-bonus of "supernatural campaign", everyone with lower Gnosis has not. So a "normal ranger" would need about 40 months (3 years and 4 months) to only learn "Use of Ki", if he only trains, to learn it. If he does something other (for example, hunting, live his normal and happy life etc.), he wouldn't learn anything. So, theoretically everyone could learn Ki, but practically they don't have the time or "will" to do it.