Do religion and spirituality play a part in ageing well? Might religious identity help us cope with age-related stressors or illness? How do we – or how do most people – define healthy ageing? These questions give rise to many answers. Some have characterized ageing in purely biological terms as a disease itself, thereby launching efforts to treat it. However, this discourse fails to consider the diverse experiences of ageing based on an array of social factors, including religious (or non-religious) belief and identity. Taking an intersectional approach, I argue that ageing is better conceptualized as an identity transition and provide evidence that the decussate role of religious identity may be particularly important in navigating various life stages and stressors associated with ageing, including retirement, caregiving, and illness. I end with an acknowledgement that although older adults have historically been more religious compared with their younger counterparts, preliminary findings suggest that this too may be changing with increasing trends of secularization globally, with potential implications for health and well-being for all of us. ‘Unravelling ageing’ is therefore a useful metaphor in helping us to challenge some of our pre-existing assumptions about what it means to age well, and to critically explore how the uniqueness of social identities related to religion and spirituality may intersect with healthy ageing in diverse contexts and across identity transitions. This article is the text that accompanied a keynote address given at the International Association for the Psychology of Religion meeting in 2025 in Birmingham, England.

This qualitative study sought to identify and describe themes related to how the Latter-day Saint community coped with the COVID-19 pandemic with particular emphasis on divine grace and meaning/purpose (M/P). It illuminates ways in which an understudied religious community accessed their faith beliefs to make sense of an unparalleled (in modern times) worldwide COVID-19 pandemic. Applying a hybrid deductive-inductive approach to qualitative thematic analysis and a limited grounded theory framework, researchers conducted, transcribed, and coded semi-structured interviews with members of the Latter-day Saint community. Several themes emerged from the data including (1) faith, religion, and religious beliefs during challenges and hardships, including relying on one’s faith to get through challenges, the focus of grace and blessings through trials, and the belief in God bringing peace; (2) role of God and God’s plan during the COVID-19 pandemic; (3) benefits of the COVID-19 pandemic and opportunities related to the COVID-19 pandemic; (4) religious/spiritual practices during the COVID-19 pandemic; and (5) global characteristics of the COVID-19 pandemic. Unique themes appeared related to God’s grace and M/P that are discussed in further detail. Overall, participants framed their responses in ways that portrayed the COVID-19 pandemic as an opportunity to practice faith and experience growth. Participants’ foundational beliefs of a loving, omnipotent God were not challenged by the COVID-19 pandemic. Rather, the COVID-19 pandemic was viewed as a method God uses to teach lessons and increase faith. Unique cultural components related to the Latter-day Saint community are discussed.

Using a sample of 403 current or former Latter-day Saint (LDS) sexual and gender minorities (SGMs), we found that LDS SGMs are most commonly counseled to increase in their faith, whereas they find it most helpful when clergy use empathic listening skills and vocalize support. We further found that current LDS SGMs reported higher levels of supportive and validating counsel than former LDS SGMs. LDS SGMs reported that they experienced adverse mental health outcomes and decreased or nuanced their faith as a result of the counsel they receive from clergy, with counsel focusing on restricting or suppressing one’s sexuality or avoiding gender expression relating to more depression for both current and former LDS SGMs.

Humility is a salient virtue for Christian formation with demonstrated relevance for religious leader effectiveness and well-being. However, humility is complex for religious leaders, as role-related factors promote and challenge healthy humility. Practicing healthy humility might be particularly complicated for religious leaders who hold non-dominant identities, such as women or Black, Indigenous, and people of color (BIPOC). Using reflexive thematic analysis, this study reports on humility experiences among eight women, most of whom were BIPOC, enrolled in an Evangelical seminary. Four overarching themes were constructed: (1) Humility is essential for Christian life but can be difficult to define , (2) Humble leadership involves negotiating intersecting identities across time and context , (3) Ministry pressure and personal tendencies challenge authentic humility , and (4) Authentic humility can and should be cultivated . Discussion includes implications for these findings and recommendations for seminarian formation.

Recently, spirituality-based interventions for modulating death anxiety in both unhealthy and healthy individuals have increased. However, the effectiveness of this treatment approach in reducing death anxiety remains controversial. Thus, this systematic review and meta-analysis aimed to clarify the impact of spiritual therapy interventions on death anxiety in Iran. We searched for all randomised and controlled trials related to the research topic in national and international databases, including Web of Science, PubMed, Scopus, Wiley, Taylor & Francis, ScienceDirect, SID, Civilica, IranDoc and Noormags. Fifteen studies with 772 participants that were found relevant and fulfilled the defined exclusion and inclusion criteria were included in the analyses. Stata 17 software was used to analyse the data. The results showed a significant difference between the average death anxiety scores in the experimental and control groups after receiving spiritual therapy (standardised mean difference = –5.97, 95% confidence interval: –9.51, –2.44). In addition, the results of the Q and I 2 tests indicated significant heterogeneity among the studies (p < 0.001; Q = 411.45; I 2 = 99.50%). Thus, although the findings show that interventions based on spiritual therapy can reduce death anxiety, the high heterogeneity and publication bias of some trials limit the validity and generalisability of their effects. The findings of this meta-analysis will help in elucidating the effectiveness of spiritual therapy and open new horizons for this therapeutic approach for psychologists, counsellors and educational planners, thereby creating a relative consensus between advocates and critics of therapeutic spirituality.

This article proposes a model of comparative mysticism that bases its rationale for comparison in the dynamic interaction between three components: neurocognitive mechanisms and substrates, phenomenal experiences, and noetic accounts. In examining the phenomenon of ego - dissolution ( EDn ), using this model, a scholar can identify universal and contextual components of a mystic’s experiences. The neurocognitive component is derived from neuroscientific studies including brain injury, psychedelics, and meditative practices. The phenomenal and noetic components are derived from personal accounts as narrated by the mystics themselves. These three components will be applied to the ego - dissolution experiences of the modern Indian mystic Sadhguru (1957–Present), the medieval Spanish mystic Teresa of Ávila (1515–1583), and individuals, including scientists, using the psychedelics psilocybin and LSD. This model should introduce an alternative approach to comparative mysticism as a response to the long-standing debate between Walter T. Stace’s essentialist model and Steven T. Katz’s contextualist model, respectively. In particular, the neurocognitive component should function as a bridge providing a deeper level of analysis encompassing and undermining differences between universalist and contextualist reductions. The advent of comparative mysticism may be seen as a collaborative effort that is multidisciplinary in nature, contributing to theology, religious studies, philosophy, history, cognitive neuroscience, and many other disciplines.

Using a sample of 593 undergraduate students, the study examined the relationship between spirituality, wisdom, and eudaimonic well-being with the purpose of testing if wisdom serves a mediating role in a directional model wherein spirituality is theorized as influencing well-being. Correlational analyses revealed that all three constructs are significantly associated. Structural equation modeling was employed and showed that wisdom acted as a partial mediator of the impact of spirituality on well-being. The study concludes with a discussion of the findings and suggestions for future research, with emphasis given to the replication of results with samples drawn from different cultures and to using longitudinal designs to better assess directional changes over time.

In spite of scientific developments, paranormal beliefs remain widespread, especially in South Asian societies. Numerous disorders connected to possession and trance have been theorized in recent years. In this study, three community samples were used to develop a comprehensive scale of Belief in Jinn Possession Scale (BJPS) and to examine its consistency and relevance. The BJPS scale was proposed to be multidimensional with four factors displaying satisfactory internal consistency reliability estimated by the exploratory factor analysis (EFA) ( n = 300). However, confirmatory factor analyses ( n = 300) reduced the number of factors to two. The BJPS demonstrated excellent reliability and statistically significant positive correlations among its factors of beliefs about signs of possession and beliefs about vulnerability and preventive measures. Convergent and discriminant validity ( n = 316) was supported by a high correlation between BJPS, Revised Paranormal Belief Scale (RPBS), and Paranormal and Supernatural Belief Scale (PSBS) and a low correlation between BJPS, Narcissistic Personality Inventory 16 (NPI-16), and Moral Identity Measure (MIM). These results suggest that the BJPS is a well-grounded and sound tool for evaluating one’s irrational beliefs about possession states in Pakistani culture, and it may be the first attempt to conceptualize possession.

The Dimensions of Spirituality Inventory (DSI) is a 50-item quantitative assessment of spirituality. Whereas “spirituality” has seemed to some to be too vague for research purposes, the DSI follows earlier qualitative research in showing that usage of the word points to an intelligible conceptual structure. Instead of defining spirituality and then operationalizing it, as most extant instruments do, the DSI defines and operationalizes 21 relatively uncontroversial elemental components of spirituality, so the overall interpretation of spirituality can only emerge after factor analysis. Just as an alphabet flexibly expresses words and sentences, so the 21 DSI dimensions permit the discovery of latent constructs corresponding to cultural packages of spirituality at the present time. The DSI avoids culturally parochial formulations of items, thanks to intense multidisciplinary engagement among social scientists, scholars of religion, and psychologists of religion, and thus is suitable for cross-cultural application. This paper reports on a study based on a participant pool recruited for ExploringMyReligion.org , in part from Prolific (N = 820, after culling unreliable responses). The DSI is interpreted and validated in relation to several other relevant measures, and the factor analysis is strongly resonant with prior qualitative studies. The psychometric properties of the DSI make it usable as an overall spirituality scale as well as a sensitive inventory of types and configurations of spirituality.

Meaning in life has become an important topic in empirical research in the psychology of religion. Although it has been studied and found applicable in many different contexts, research on meaning in life and sources of meaning in African countries is scarce. This study qualitatively investigates understandings and experiences of meaning in life and sources of meaning among urban and village dwellers with different educational backgrounds in Zambia. Seven focus group interviews (total N = 52) were conducted and analysed, drawing on Schnell’s model of meaning in life and sources of meaning. The results indicate that the concept of meaning in life is relevant to both urban and village dwellers in Zambia. Meaning experiences and sources of meaning are associated with certain life domains: relationships; religion; education and work; leisure activities; and health and survival. Each life domain includes several fundamental sources of meaning, which can be related to Schnell’s four dimensions of sources of meaning: self-transcendence, self-actualisation, order and well-being and relatedness. The results are discussed in light of extant studies on meaning and cultural characteristics in Africa.