3. Holy War
FF7 has a lot of seemingly Judeo-Christian stuff going on. Central to the plot are a group of nomadic spiritual and nearly extinct people referred to simply as "The Ancients." (or sometimes "Cetra") The ancients had wandered the Earth in search of the "Promised Land". Sephiroth, the game's biggest, baddest heavy and - world's greatest soldier - discovers not only that he and his mother have been experimented on, like lab rats, by Shinra, but also that they are the descendants of this ancient race of peoples. Whom the normals have genocidally brought to near extinction, out of fear and ignorance. That's the catalyst for his psychotic break, and there's no stopping him from there, not even the truth; that he's not an "Ancient" after all. It doesn't matter to him. His war is more important. His name "Sephiroth" is even Hebrew for the physical manifestations of God, and many other elements of his story mirror those in Judeo-Christian legend. But players might forget that AVALANCHE, the terrorist cell that Barrett Wallace heads up, is religiously motivated as well. When arriving at Cosmo Canyon Barrett has a spiritual connection to the locale. He says it is here AVALANCHE was born. Cosmo canyon is where he first learned that mako energy is actually the Earth's life force, and that dwindling it to nothing will leave it a lifeless crumbling heap. True as it appears to be in the narrative, it's taken on faith by our heroes. Since preventing this apocalypse is central to the narrative, we never quite see it in practice, and so can't be (entirely) certain of it's authenticity. Yet they believe it, and they're willing to kill for it. Of course, so is Shinra. Who believe that discovering the promised land will lead them to the greatest supply of oil they've ever seen. - Mako... I mean mako...