#might signify that she's not necessarily as devout as she makes it out to be

[starvingtongue]

can you speak about dona's relationship with yevon? how devout would you say she was? how hard was it for her to let go?

Ooo okay, y'know what, I've actually been wanting to touch on this for a while. Ever since I finished watching/listening to State of the Arc's podcast of Final Fantasy X, specifically when they mentioned on how open Dona's outfit is as a summoner compared to the others (I forget what part it is, I'm sorry, but the whole podcast is worth listening to), I've been trying to formulate how best to describe her relationship with Yevon.

Because all the other Summoners we see in X wear very traditional kimono-esque outfits, that cover pretty much their entire body. From Yuna to Isaaru to Belgemine to Ginnem to Zuke to Braska, even if they're not all kimono-esque, they're still very modest compared to Dona's. Heck, even the Warrior Monks were some semblance of Kimono or modest dress. I guess it signifies their devoution to Yevon and their willingness to committ themselves to the faith, and subsequently the pilgrimage, much in the same way a lot of followers of real world religions dress modestly. Nearly all of the clergy, the priests, and the priestesses we see in ffx and ffx-2 are dressed very modestly, like from ankle to knee, some from the chin downwards, with their hair covered. I'm not sure if there might've been a teaching or some sort of scripture in Yevon that asks this of their most devout, and I don't really want to speculate on it too much, but it wouldn't surprise me.

That being said, the only summoners (as far as I know) that don't dress this modestly are Yunalesca and Dona (edited to add Seymour into the mix here as well. His one isn't as loose as Dona's or Yunalesca's, but still fairly open in comparison). Yunalesca performed the final summoning and all that before Yevon was even a thing, so I can understand why she might not have the whole kimono-esque, modesty thing going on, but Dona? Dona was raised on an island with a temple, studied at the temple to become a summoner, presumably followed the teachings and the scriptures (to an extent) up until the end of X, attended classes at the temples, and all that jazz. So what's up?

This isn't to say she isn't devout in some respects, but the Dona we see at the start of X is a lot less devout than a few years prior. However, living on an island such as Kilika, a place that the main village is built on shallow water, has a tendancy to get destroyed or damaged by Sin quite frequently. Dona, as someone who has lived on said island her entire life, has witnessed a lot of death and destruction. Despite her constantly praying at the temple, all of the classes, nearly everyone around her doing the same, Dona had a crisis of faith. Where some people might seek more comfort in their religious practice after so much death and destruction, Dona went the opposite way. All this death, all this destruction, all this pain and suffering and the threat of losing her home over and over again, culminating in the teachings, the scriptures, Yevon itself as a belief system, bringing her less and less comfort as the years went on.

She still trained as a summoner, she still wanted Sin gone, she hated seeing people suffer, losing their loved ones, losing their homes, losing everything, regardless of if they were from Kilika or not. That's why she continued her training, regardless of if her faith was placed in the religon or not. Her decision was for the people, not because of Yevon itself told her too.

All this isn't to say that she isn't devout, to an extent, to the teachings of Yevon. In her own way, she very much is, she helps with sendings, she follows the teachings, but a lot of it is very surface level. She isn't terribly swayed by the teachings, or doesn't take what the priests say to heart too much, she doesn't seem to care that chucking Tidus into the Cloister of Trails in Kilika could land her in as much trouble with Yevon as much as it would Yuna and Co. She has an underlying disinterest, maybe bordering on a lack of conviction, in the teachings by this point. She follows the teachings only because that's what's expected of her as a summoner. She shows herself praying at the temples, liasing with the priests, performing sendings where appropriate, because that's what summoners are expected to do. If anything, she does the bare minimum, that's as far as her faith goes.

She never says outright this however, Dona's not an idiot. She's heard of Braska before he went and killed Sin to become a martyr. She knows her path could easily follow Braska's if she came out and said that, as a summoner, she doesn't truly believe in the teachings much anymore, that that aspect of her being a summoner is mostly performative. She knows that if she came out and said these things and didn't defeat Sin like Braska did, she'd be shunned by the church. Dona's not an idiot, she knows when to keep her mouth shut.

And that's why her robes/kimono-esque/summoner clothing is so open compared to the other summoners we see. Because she feels a lot less tied to the religion than the other summoners. And so, I suppose, when she sees Yevon crumble, it wasn't terribly hard for her to outwardly let go. By the time Yevon crumbles, her attachment to it as a system is like sand falling through her fingers. She wasn't entirely surprised in learning that Yevon was so corrupt, but considering how performative her faith was and looking back on all the evidence, it all made sense.

All the same, it took her a few months to truly accept it, to truly process it all, as I'm sure it would for anybody else, regardless of if they were overly religious or not. The fact that she no longer had any ties to the Fayth and the Aeons didn't help matters, and possibly muddied the waters futher. Yet, despite her feelings by the start of X, Yevon and it's teachings had provided her with some level of comfort growing up. The temples and their incense, the praying at the statues, the praying to the Fayth, the calming voices of the priests and priestesses in times of strife, it all provided her with some comfort when times were hard, when Sin had swept through the village and destroyed parts, when she lost friends and family in Sin's wake.

Yevon's destruction did shake her, but it was the loss of that level of comfort that struck her more. She was able to shake off Yevon, the corrupt parts of it, the prospect of damnation if she didn't follow every little teaching to a fault, silencing any and all that disagreed with Yevon with brute force, the hypocrisy, without too much of a second though. If her faith was a lot stronger, she might've had a harder job of it, but she didn't. We see in X-2, she is very happy to barge her way through the priests and tell them to shut the fuck up, I think by that point, she's truly shaken off Yevon as a while. There wasn't much to shake off, but any devoution she had left is gone by X-2.