Some ideas, you can resserect your self if you die or your own thrall / mount, or guards.
When you use the religion symbol you can learn different blessings that you can use on your character.
You could call down resources on the ground nearby for you to harvest, build statues in the Artisan table then use essence to make the statue living to guard your base / clan base, I want to use powers/blessings to do something practical and fun with the religion symbol.