Pavlovian response to scupper one's religious hope? (9)
I believe the answer is:
salvation
'pavlovian response' is the definition.
The definition and answer can be both acts as well as being singular nouns.
Maybe there's an association between them I don't understand?
'to scupper one's religious hope?' is the wordplay.
I cannot really understand how this works, but
'one' could be 'i' (Roman numeral) and 'i' is present in the answer.
'to' is within the answer.
This may be the basis of the clue (or it may be nonsense).
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for salvation that I've seen before include "Deliverance from evil" , "Help" , "Deliverance (from sin)" , "Alias on TV (anag) - Christian's aim?" , "Major Barbara's Army" .)