The Search for Meaning Without Illusion
The question that once haunted Dostoevsky, Nietzsche, and Camus—whether one can live a moral, meaningful life without belief in God—has returned to contemporary philosophy with fresh urgency. Swedish-American philosopher Martin Hägglund, in his landmark book This Life: Secular Faith and Spiritual Freedom (2019), not only answers this question affirmatively but constructs an entire philosophical framework around what he calls secular faith.
This is not militant atheism in the Dawkins mold, nor a cold allegiance to scientific facts. Hägglund speaks of a spirituality of finitude—a worldview in which our very mortality, fragility, and impermanence become the deepest sources of commitment, love, hope—and freedom.
Secular Faith: Caring as a Form of Belief
Hägglund begins his book with a simple yet profound insight: belief is not limited to theology. Any form of deep attachment—love, responsibility, planning for the future—is an act of faith. Not faith in eternal life or divine reward, but faith that something in this life matters, precisely because it is vulnerable and finite.
Caring for a partner’s health, for instance, expresses faith—not in immortality, but in the preciousness of their finite life. Time’s fragility gives weight to every moment. In this sense, Hägglund argues, secular faith is not the absence of belief, but a deeper kind of belief—one rooted in the reality and value of mortal existence itself.
Between Augustine and Marx
The first half of This Life reinterprets Christian thinkers like Augustine, showing how even religious faith often draws on secular concerns: care, time, human connection. But the book’s heart lies in its second half, where Hägglund turns to Karl Marx.
For Hägglund, Marx was not only a critic of capitalism but also a philosopher of spiritual freedom—not freedom from material need, but the ability to devote our time to what truly matters. Real freedom, then, is about mastering our time, setting our own priorities, and choosing what is good for us, as finite beings.
Spirituality Without Redemption
Hägglund’s most radical claim is that belief in eternal salvation—life after death, heaven, the soul’s survival—actually empties this life of meaning. If what truly matters is safe from loss, there is no need to fight for it, care for it, or love it deeply.
In contrast, life lived with awareness of its limits demands dedication, focus, and a recognition of our shared vulnerability. This is a spirituality that doesn’t seek escape from the world—but deeper immersion in it.
When We Forget That Life Is Finite
Hägglund does not stop at abstract critique. He sees our cultural denial of mortality as a profound political and economic issue. In a world where time is measured by productivity, where youth and health are idolized, we develop an obsession with permanence—life extension, anti-aging, distraction from boredom. These, he argues, mask a deeper fear: that this life is all we have. And that it is enough.
Freedom Begins Here
This Life is a rare kind of philosophical work: intellectually rigorous, emotionally stirring. It offers a vision of meaning grounded not in fantasy but in love, labor, and belief in this life—not as a rehearsal, but as the finite and beautiful game we are already playing.
It’s a powerful call for a new kind of ethics—one that doesn’t demand belief in eternity but calls us to fully inhabit the present. Not out of despair, but out of responsibility. Out of hope. Secular faith, in the end, is nothing less than a call to live a life that is worthy—precisely because it is limited.
See also: Religion in the Modern Age: Peter Berger on Pluralistic Faith
