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Our Roots
Salvation

There are thousands of books on the history of man’s religions. They record the beliefs, symbols, legends, and rituals of all peoples. These have a common theme-the notion of salvation.

Two points stand out clearly in this material: that people are imperfect and that they need outside help. A few examples will illustrate this:

1. The Navaho Indians of the Southwest believe in the power of their gods. They worship them in distinctive ceremonies in order to gain their protection.
2. The ancient Sumerians, Assyrians, and Babylonians worshipped a number of gods, especially Marduk, who was thought to reward them with his blessings.
3. The Egyptians were very concerned about death and the afterlife. In their burial chambers, they provided for other necessities for their continued life in another world.
4. Similarly, the Greeks and Romans were careful about which gods they should sacrifice to and how to do it. The Greek “mystery” religions had a concept of salvation similar in some ways to that of the Christians. They believed their secret rituals would unite the believer to their god, and confer bliss and immortality on him.
5. The aim of the Hindus is to reach oneness with God, whom they believe may be considered either as personal or impersonal. The doctrine of reincarnation is fundamental for them. People are believed to have to return again and again to this world to work out their perfection. The Buddhists hold similar beliefs, but their ultimate value, whether it be called Nirvana or Dharma or Moksha, could only be called “God” in a very accurate sense.
6. Finally, Judaism, Christianity and Islam explicitly hold the idea of the individual’s salvation.

Therefore, salvation is the distinctive, inclusive and essential theme of all religions. Salvation delivers the believer from estrangement from the gods or God, and restores both parties to their proper relationship.

The process of salvation can be divided into three major aspects: the faults to be
conquered; the means to do this; and restoration of the proper relationship with God.

In Jewish belief, Yahweh saves by His power, often through human means. In the Hebrew Bible, His most magnificent saving act is His deliverance of Israel out of Egypt (the Exodus). During the Babylonian Exile and the Post-Exilic period, the Jewish concept of God’s power deepened and became more universal. Salvation came to mean the promise of a future redemption, both national and personal. Christianity sees this redemption realized in the person of Jesus.

In Christian belief, Jesus’ Incarnation, death and Resurrection mean salvation. It is the divinely established way of liberation from sin and reconciliation with God. God’s grace, of course, has always been available as an unearned gift of love. We can only respond to the gift of grace. Salvation is an act of God’s love.

Can non-Christians be saved?
Clearly, non-Christians can be saved, and are saved. This positive answer rests on the notion of grace. Grace is God’s total and complete presence, even though it may be revealed in many different ways at different times. It has always existed and been available; therefore, the primitive and ancient peoples, who did not know Jesus and the one God, certainly experienced God’s grace. Their salvation depended, like that of all of us, on their response to it. Obviously, they had to deal with this in light of their knowledge and experience.

The ancient non-Christians religions of the Egyptians, Greeks, Romans, etc., all had some sense of divinity, some practice of worship and morality, and some belief in an afterlife. They ranged from polytheism to monotheism, and every shade of belief in between. Some modern non-Christian religions, such as Zoroastrianism, Islam, and Judaism, believe in one God. Hinduism is both polytheistic and monotheistic. It worships many gods, but sees them all as aspects of the one God, called Brahman. Buddhism holds to the belief in a state of ultimate liberation, enlightenment and bliss, called Nirvana. Buddhism may be called a non-theistic religion. Taoism is directed to the perception of the ultimate principle of the universe, called the Tao. Shintoism is an extremely archaic Japanese religion, based on polytheism and nature worship.

Judaism has always had a special relationship with Christianity for obvious historical and theological reasons. Christianity came out of Judaism; as Pope Pius XI once said, “Spiritually, we are all Semites.” The Jews are still the covenant people; they were never (contrary to what some Christians have said) abandoned by God; Jesus cam from them; they (as well as others) are called to the final Kingdom of God.

Father Richard McBrien, the noted theologian, said it well: “God is available to all peoples widely differentiated as they are by time, by geography, by culture, by language, by temperament, by social and economic conditions, etc. Revelation is received according to the mode of the receiver and the response to revelation (religion) is necessarily shaped by that mode of reception.”

And so, the non-Christians can by saved. Christians are reminded that since grace exists in these groups, we must respect their freedom and work with them on projects of mutual concern.