I'm trying to write a sentence in which the primary action occurred in the past, but within that sentence is another subject-verb pair in which the verb describes a perpetual state of being. Here is my original sentence, which recounts a time when I was getting familiar with Christianity as a child:
I had no idea what a savior is.
"savior is" is the subject-verb pair in question. It sounds funny to me, but it seems grammatically correct. I'm not sure though.
I tried the following variation:
I had no idea what "savior" means.
Again, I feel like this is correct, but with "had" as past tense and "means" as present tense, they sound off in the same sentence. If I change "is" and "means" to past tense, they sound better in my head. But the word "savior" will always have a definition, and the concept of a savior will always exist. So the verbs should be in present tense, no?
Thanks!