P5+NSotomayor

Title:
Religion: Then and Now

Begin Text:
Why is it that something that should bring peace and enlightenment to the people, like religion, have to be surrounded by so much controversy? In the novel //The Scarlet Letter// by Nathaniel Hawthorne, the author explores religion and compares it to the world he lived in. Religion in the nation’s identity is very different than that of the world that Hester lived in. In the world of today the nation cannot connect with religion as one, because there are various types of religion and some people don’t believe in religion. The cycle of transgression, shame, repentance, and acceptance that Hawthorne uses can be applied to the nation’s identity of today as well as in the time that Hawthorne wrote the novel. Hawthorne’s cycle can be connected to religion and how the nation identifies itself.

Religion could be able to work in the nation because many laws are based on religious laws. The cycle that Hawthorne used in his novel reoccurs throughout the world. In religion, when you commit a sin you feel shame, repent and then you are accepted back into society as a normal person. This cycle occurs through life because after doing something wrong you repent about it and are forgiven. In the time that the novel was written, religion was not as important, the cycle that Hawthorne wrote about was not as severely used in his generation. A connection that Hawthorne makes in his novel is when he said, “Such helpfulness was found in her -- so much power to sympathize-- that many people refused to interpret the scarlet ‘A’ by its original signification. . .”This connects to the nation because after a period of time people forget about things. Hawthorne’s cycle fits in with religion and the world of today, but religion is no longer united in everyone.

The national identity of religion cannot be as open as Hawthorne wrote about it because there is no longer one main religion in the country. The cycle of transgression, shame. repentance, and acceptance would conflict with religion and politics. What Hawthorne tried to say was that when people begin to mix religion with politics the system breaks down. This is explained when Pearl said, “I have no heavenly father!” Hawthorne tried to show that by Pearl not believing in God she didn’t have to deal with the religious cycle that he wrote about. The system that Hawthorne finds inexistent is that of “forgive and forget”. This is shown when he said “Ah but let her cover the mark as she will the pang of it will always be in her heart.” This is similar to the national identity because when a crime is committed it is rarely forgotten entirely. Although Hawthorne’s cycle is used today the acceptance of an individual is done but with some restrictions.

The national identity and that of the identity in //The Scarlet Letter// is very different because religion can no longer be used as the basis of our government. The cycle that Hawthorne created is the basis concept of most religions, but it does not have the right to operate as the main power of government. The separation of powers that has been instituted has been able to let the cycle that Hawthorne wrote about operate on many different levels. All three time periods that we discussed can use the cycle in religion, but as time has passed it has become less severe. The national identity of religion uses Hawthorne’s cycle but not as a whole, due to the solution of seperation of church and state.