The editors introduce the special issue on atheism and the meaning of life, providing an overview of its scope and a concise summary of the contributions included in the issue.

This paper argues that the contemporary shift from the meaning of life to meaning in life reflects not a rejection of transcendence but a transformation in its structure. It distinguishes between absolute transcendence, which locates meaning within a comprehensive horizon beyond the situated subject, and immanent transcendence, which understands transcendence as the inexhaustibility of lived experience and interpretation. The former tends towards a third-person perspective and risks displacing the subject as the locus of meaning. The latter preserves the first-person perspective and grounds meaning in the subject’s relation to experiences, actions, and events that exceed its control. This shift also challenges the primacy of narrative identity: while narratives render actions intelligible, events reveal a more fundamental, pre-reflective dimension of subjectivity, identified here as the minimal self. Drawing on Taoist and Buddhist perspectives, particularly the concept of śūnyatā, the paper argues that meaning in life emerges through participation in a relational reality rather than through the fulfilment of an externally given purpose. Transcendence thus becomes an immanent feature of lived existence.

This article develops an original account of the value of authenticity for meaning in life that explains how and when acting authentically enhances meaning in life. I argue that we appropriate meaningful actions by acting authentically, contra Joseph Raz’s (2001) position that appropriation occurs through attachments. Authentic actions are distinctly owned by the individual and the more a meaningful action is appropriated, the more it contributes to the meaning in their life. Considering authenticity as an enhancing factor for a meaningful life refines accounts of meaning in life and strengthens objectivist approaches against objections. The value authenticity holds for meaning in life is furthermore not susceptible to the critique of immoral or self-centered authenticity.

The paper aims to test why people from the general population intend to volunteer in the future. Our study tests empathy (affective and cognitive) as the intrinsic antecedent, satisfaction with life and meaning in life as the endocentric antecedents, and social value orientation as the ipsocentric antecedent of the intention to engage in volunteering. The paper is based on a 2-wave longitudinal online, questionnaire-based study (N = 566) performed on a general sample of Polish residents in May 2022 and May 2023. Results of structural equation modeling indicated that empathy at time 1 of the study predicted subsequent volunteering intention (when controlling for other variables in the model). Moreover, the volunteering intention at time 1 predicted social value orientation at time 2, and endocentric antecedents at time 1 negatively predicted empathy at time 2. The results suggest that concern for others and their welfare is the strongest factor associated with intentions to volunteer in the general population. Practitioners should consider that people with higher dispositional empathy might be the best targets for volunteer recruitment.

Living in a nursing home can provide essential support for older adults, yet may also give rise to existential challenges that may contribute to the elevated prevalence of depressive symptoms among nursing home residents (NHRs). Existing research largely emphasizes bio-psycho-social risk factors, paying comparatively limited attention to existential concerns relating to depressive symptoms – and whether they represent meaningful targets for mental health interventions in nursing homes. This study examined the longitudinal associations between two existential concerns – meaning in life (MIL) and existential loneliness (EL) – and depressive symptoms in 243 residents from 22 Belgian nursing homes assessed annually over three years. Random intercept cross-lagged panel models were used to disentangle between-person and within-person effects. At the between-person level, residents with higher MIL and lower EL reported fewer depressive symptoms. At the within-person level, associations were more complex and reversed: depending on the model, increases in EL predicted fewer depressive symptoms over time, and higher depressive symptoms predicted subsequent increases in MIL. These findings diverged from conclusions based on classical cross-lagged models, indicating that existential concerns relate to depressive symptoms among NHRs differently depending on analysis level. While the between-person findings suggest the existence of a vulnerable subgroup of residents with persistently elevated existential concerns and concurrent depressive symptoms, it remains unclear whether changes in existential concerns will consistently translate into reductions in depressive symptoms within individuals over time. This highlights the need for further research on within-person existential dynamics, potentially on shorter timescales, to inform evidence-based intervention development in nursing homes.

This article develops a novel argument that God’s existence would greatly increase our prospects for meaning in life. The key idea is that if God exists, He stands in certain relations to the world that would confer value upon it. For instance, God would be its creator and sustainer. The world would thus gain value in much the way that relics gain value by their links with historical persons and events. And crucially, as a result of this infusion of value, our lives go better because the things we engage with matter more.

Objectivist naturalists about life's meaning regard it as implicating no world but the natural one, and yet as deriving from more than just subjective attitudes or interests. Such naturalists must obviously deny prominent religious conceptions of meaning. But must they further deny that it can be found in religious pursuits? In this article, I defend a negative answer by arguing that, contrary to a prima facie plausible consideration in support of a positive answer, and by many objectivist naturalists’ own lights, the meaning of life can be found in pursuits predicated on false belief.

Positively experienced relationships with family, partners and friends are the most important source of meaning in life for older persons. At the same time, Western countries are confronted with a growing number of socially isolated older adults who lack those relationships. This study aims to explore whether and how older adults who live in social isolation experience meaning in life. Data were collected via in-depth, semi-structured interviews with 24 socially isolated older adults, ranging in age from 62 to 94, all living in Rotterdam, The Netherlands. The criterion-based sampling of participants took place in close consultation with social workers of a mentoring project for socially isolated older adults. Follow-up interviews with 22 participants improved the credibility of findings and contributed to the breadth and depth of the researched casuistry. Data were analysed using an analytical framework based on seven needs of meaning identified by Baumeister (purpose, values, efficacy, self-worth) and Derkx (coherence, excitement, connectedness). The study demonstrates that isolated older adults may find anchors for meaning in life, although not all needs for meaning are satisfied, and there can also be tension between different needs. The needs-based model provides concrete distinctions for enabling care-givers to recognise elements of meaning.

I aim to more fully develop a theory of meaning in life based on the concept of life force that is important to a substantial number of Africans in the sub-Sahara region. While life force implies a large invisible ontology, Thaddeus Metz has recently developed an entirely naturalistic version of it known as liveliness. However, he also offers two objections that hinge on the idea that life force cannot accommodate intuitions that certain types of knowledge and progress are valuable for their own sakes. I respond by noting that elsewhere Metz has developed a defense of the intrinsic value of knowledge by appealing to the idea that meeting a person's existential needs can be important for self-realization and hence for their meaning. If this is right, then the community ought to support such a person in their pursuit of knowledge even if doing so leads to no useful outcomes.

Contemporary analytic treatments of meaning in life in the English-speaking Anglo-American-Australasian tradition have largely proceeded from the atheistic and naturalistic assumptions common to the sciences. With the recent publication of Seachris and Goetz's God and Meaning (2016), T. J. Mawson's God and the Meanings of Life (2016), and Thaddeus Metz's God, Soul and the Meaning of Life (2019), more analytic philosophers might be drawn to (re)examining what role, if any, God might play in life's meaning. But the focus tends to be on ‘God’ as understood in the Abrahamic faiths. Examining meaning in the light of another concept of God, familiar to billions of individuals in various Eastern religions and intellectual traditions, might offer useful insights. I have two principle aims in this article. First, I describe an ancient Indian concept of ‘God’, showing how it radically differs from the concept of God currently under examination by philosophers of meaning. Second, I offer a novel case for why and how this concept of ‘God’ could fruitfully contribute to analytic discussions on God's possible role in life's meaning.

Many philosophers now see meaning in life as a key evaluative category that stands alongside well-being and moral goodness. Our lives are assessed not only by how well they go for us and how morally good they are, but also by their meaningfulness. In this article, I raise a challenge to this view. Theories of meaning in life closely resemble theories of well-being, and there is a suspicion that the former collapse into the latter. I develop this challenge showing that it is formidable. I then answer it by offering a novel account of what meaning in life is and how it differs from well-being. The account I offer is able to resist the strongest form of the challenge while also having much intuitive appeal.