Ziemska soteriologia Ameryki

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 salva-tion offers a point of entry. Definitions of salvation are diverse and often incopmatible. In American civil religion everyone had a right to pass through the zone of abundance, and in time, it was thought, everyone 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.