This Life

Secular Faith and Spiritual Freedom

By: Martin Hägglund

Narrated by: Kirby Heyborne

Winner of the René Wellek Prize

Named a Best Book of the Year by The Guardian, The Millions, and The Sydney Morning Herald

A profound, original, and accessible book that offers a new secular vision of how we can lead our lives. Ranging from fundamental existential questions to the most pressing social issues of our time, This Life shows why our commitment to freedom and democracy should lead us beyond both religion and capitalism.

In this groundbreaking book, the philosopher Martin Hägglund challenges our received notions of faith and freedom. The faith we need to cultivate, he argues, is not a religious faith in eternity but a secular faith devoted to our finite life together. He shows that all spiritual questions of freedom are inseparable from economic and material conditions. What ultimately matters is how we treat one another in this life, and what we do with our time together.

Hägglund develops new existential and political principles while transforming our understanding of spiritual life. His critique of religion takes us to the heart of what it means to mourn our loved ones, be committed, and care about a sustainable world. His critique of capitalism demonstrates that we fail to sustain our democratic values because our lives depend on wage labor. In clear and pathbreaking terms, Hägglund explains why capitalism is inimical to our freedom, and why we should instead pursue a novel form of democratic socialism.

In developing his vision of an emancipated secular life, Hägglund engages with great philosophers from Aristotle to Hegel and Marx, literary writers from Dante to Proust and Knausgaard, political economists from Mill to Keynes and Hayek, and religious thinkers from Augustine to Kierkegaard and Martin Luther King, Jr. This Life gives us new access to our past—for the sake of a different future.

Intriguing ideas with insufferable narrator

The ideas in the book are interesting, however the narrator is over the top preachy. Impossible for me to listen to for more than a few minutes.

A Comprehensive Critique of Society and Belief

I chose to read this book in the hope of reading an argument for a Secular Worldview on which to base a Life. What Hägglund has given us is a Critique that takes the reader to a World beyond both Religion and Capitalism.

Using the writings of Aristotle, Hegel, Kierkegaard, Marx and Martin Luther King, he builds a case for a Society based not on Capitalist Theology but on a Secular Faith requiring recognition and appreciation of our finitude and dependence on each other, essentially a Marxist Democratic Socialist Society.

His argument is deeply rooted in the works of these and other writers and ultimately quite attractive. I like his rejection of Eternal Life as the ultimate goal of our days on Earth and of our dependence on profit driven exploitation of wage labor as motivation for getting out of bed each morning. My own politics leans toward this Democratic Socialist model though I’m not sure 21st Century America leans with me.

Whether his vision may ever come into fruition, I think he gives the Progressive Reader some basis for hope. It’s not an easy book, but one definitely worth arguing over. Four stars.

Great first half, unproven second half

The author does a great job explaining life from a secular perspective and is pretty based. He makes an excellent point that because time is finite, that makes it valuable. That because our actions have consequences, they are worth thinking about seriously. There are many great ideas and observations in the first half of this book.

However, he then goes into his own theory on how to go about restructuring society in a way that would value collective decision making and give everyone the opportunity to have the time for the spiritual and philosophical development one needs to decide on what they really want to do with their life.

While his criticisms of capitalism are valid, that does not make his proposed solutions better. Changing the fabric of society is not something to take lightly. He calls for a massive restructuring of society, just so that we can attempt a different outcome. He neglects the possibility of corruption and collapse that has plagued socialism in its past. He offers no safeguards, protections, or acknowledgement of this level of risk.

A modern must-read.

Hägglund has done an incredible job distilling a wondrous take on secularism without the jarring displeasures seen from many anti-theists. The long chapter on Democratic Socialism alone is worth it. I have a physical copy and an Audible copy and will read and listen to this multiple times. The narrator Kirby Heybourne did a fantastic job with the material.

Incredible

Such an amazing introduction into democratic socialism and the current (but hidden) issues within our capitalist society. By engaging the reader with the idea of the brevity of life, Hagglund achieves a quest in sharing crucial knowledge.