In addition to the need to find your deity (which can be close to hell if you're unlucky) as it is now, I propose an additional possibility.

Any Imm watching your empowerment char who sees something he likes (good rp, cool role/desc) can 'vote' for you. Whenever you're given an experience bonus for whatever reason, you get a 'behind the screens vote', when you've gathered three, you automatically receive first empowerment (up to lvl25 or whatever).

For second empowerment, you need to gather 10 votes. The current prayer and a chat with your God procedure ofcourse stays valid. And ofcourse, your God can remove the empowerment at any given time.

Possibly if you gotten empowered you wouldn't be empowered for your sphere, but just by 'The Divine', so to get a tattoo, you'd still need to find your deity, get 'sphere-empowered' and earn a tattoo.

In effect, I think this will provide a way out if you just can't find a matching time to play at to meet your deity.

"What is mind, don't matter. What is matter? Nevermind"