Patriotism is supporting your country all the time, and your government when it deserves it.

-Mark Twain

At one time, patriotism meant possessing the enthusiasm and courage to challenge government rules and regulations regardless of fashionable opinion. Today, though, the meaning of patriotism has become a vague subject.

Americans like to think of themselves as patriotic. Women and men, old and young, rich and poor, whites and blacks, urbanites and farmers: nearly everyone agrees that they are “patriotic”.

But really how frequently do you hear someone actually elucidate on what they mean when they pronounce themselves as patriotic. The meaning of patriotism has always been somewhat of a moving target. It has different connotations for different people at different periods throughout history. It is ceaselessly open to reinterpretation, and has been a loaded term called upon to make the case for a variety of issues such as military sacrifice, unity and opposition, inclusion and exclusion, anti-Communism, anti-Catholicism—the list could go on and on.

To some patriotism merely signifies a love and dedication to one's country, being strictly devoted to something and trying to do what is good and right. Patriotism doesn’t necessarily need to imply that we are superior to everyone else; it just means that we are extremely proud of what we as a nation have accomplished and that we have no plans of giving any of it up. It is understood that most of us wish for “world peace”, but furthermore the recognition that there are also those few who want to do us harm and that we must guard ourselves and protect each other from such confused people. As patriots, we are aware that our liberties come with responsibilities and, if necessary, we must defend those rights.

Patriotism does not have to entail nationalism; it is not a religion, nor is it politics. It isn’t limited by time or space, and (although often depending on the subtext) has no correlation to individual gain or personal pain. It is a feeling, a sense of a bond with, and a love for something that is, at once, both deeply your own and legitimately of equal value to all. True patriotism is a piece of one’s soul and one’s conscience, a sense of belonging to something greater than one’s self.