Salvation in Nation

Abstract

Every functioning nation – R.W. Wiliams points out – has to an important degree a common religion. The possession of a common set of ideas, rituals and
symbols can supply an overarching sense of unity even in a society riddled with conflicts. Nation exists through a process of transmission quite as much as biological life. The transmission occurs by means of communication of habits of doing, thinking and feeling from the older to the younger. Without this communication of ideals, hopes, expectations, opinions from these members of national society who are passing out of the group life to those who are coming into it, social life could not survive. The search for salvation is an obviously important component of the quest. For many people in this essentially individualistic culture, it is a preoccupation that virtually eclipses the idea of social justice, the other central dimension of the search. At the very least, the pursuit of salvation offers a point of entry. Definitions of salvation are diverse and often incopmatible. In every national religion everyone had a right to pass through the zone of abundance, and in time, it was thought, ebveryone would. As the goal of general abundance was approached the major social problems of discrimination, poverty, unemployment, divisive material inequalities and environmental stress would become manageable. Some people might define abundance itself as the promised land: others might move on from material satiety to new psychological and spiritual frontiers. Thinking about national, Polish salvation author tried to find some new questions about the national identity.