Feeling Like Your Faith is Dying? You're Not Alone.
A look into 'Mid-Faith Crisis' by Catherine McNiel and Jason Hague, and why it's essential reading now.
A few weeks ago I was sitting in my favorite room of the house—the one with my favorite sofa and the big picture window. Morning light and coffee were fresh. The house still. These are sacred hours minutes of the day for me and if I add a new book to the scene then I will officially be a well-fueled mom.
On this particular morning, the book in my hand was an early copy of Mid-Faith Crisis: Finding a Path Through Doubt, Disillusionment, and Dead Ends by Catherine McNiel and Jason Hague. I finished reading the second chapter and my first thought was “whoa, this book is so needed right now.”
I could use buzz words to highlight some themes—deconstruction, church hurt, trauma, burnout—but that would be doing a disservice because the book feels more like slowly releasing a collective pressure valve, one that makes space for us to breathe rather than panic over questions of faith.
The path of faith inherently includes seasons that feel like the death of faith.
— Catherine McNiel and Jason Hague, Mid-Faith Crisis (2025)
Somehow I lucked out in the last few months and got paired with Catherine for mentorship through a writer’s guild. Amid launching a book (and a kid), she made space for me to pick her brain about all things writerly. It’s been a true gift! I share this only to say that I’m not recommending a book because I was asked to—I’m recommending a book because I asked her if I could knowing it would be quality because she is quality. These kinds of a connections help me discern if I really want to dive into something so I hope it will spur you onward in the direction of ordering her book.
And in case that wasn’t enough, keep scrolling for a peak inside the book…
The following excerpt is taken from Mid-Faith Crisis by Catherine McNiel and Jason Hague. Copyright (c) 2025 by Catherine Lynn McNiel and Jason Lester Hague. Used by permission of InterVarsity Press. www.ivpress.com
Adam has a friend he worries about named Jeremy. Jeremy is asking questions that sound dangerous, and there is often pain or anger in his voice. He points to fallen leaders and toxic teachings; he wonders if there really is an eternal hell where God tortures his creatures, and if God only loves Christians. Actually, he wonders if God is even truly loving—or if an all-powerful being really exists. Jeremy appreciates his friends’ attempts to encourage him but ultimately isn’t helped by the answers they find so comforting.
Jeremy is neck deep in Stage Three: Mid-Faith, and it’s no surprise he’s struggling. This stage is nearly always kindled by life’s heartaches and upheaval. Some people face new evidence about their faith communities, history, or doctrines that throws them for a loop. Or they encounter compelling points of view that challenge their earlier convictions, and they realize the answers they stood on weren’t as solid as they believed. Others get worn down by the burdens and troubles of life and wonder how the good news adds any goodness to the real world.
However we arrive at Mid-Faith, this stage does not feel like growth: it shatters many of our earlier faith illusions and brings pain. There’s no way to reset the clock, no way to unsee all we’ve seen or put Pandora back in her box. This is why we’re calling it a mid-faith crisis. The path of faith inherently includes seasons that feel like the death of faith. We cannot deny or avoid this. The only way out is through.
The two of us hit this stage at very different times and in vastly different ways. Catherine’s mid-faith crisis hit in childhood, and it hit hard, forming her origin story. When she was exiled at age twelve, she was left with a deep sense of rejection, unworthiness, and disorientation. She lost the opportunity to be rooted and grounded in the soils of a confident faith, to be named by a community of faith. Her disillusionment, you might say, set in before she was fully illusioned.
Jason took a more typical route. He entered into crisis more slowly, death by a thousand paper cuts. Each pain—the loss of certainty, the unanswered prayers, the failure of trusted mentors—shook another brick loose in the foundation of his faith until one last blow sent him reeling.
If you’re in stage three, Mid-Faith, you might feel as though something precious and necessary is being yanked away, melting rapidly, or being flushed down the drain. None of it feels like a choice, and certainly not like growth or health. Our spirits cry out: What’s wrong? Who is at fault? Did I fail? Did God fail? What happened to my faith?
The experience of mid-faith crisis is a wilderness. We feel alone with our questions, alienated from the answers and people that gave us life.
But we have good news, friend: we are not alone. This thing that hit so hard and so unexpectedly is, in truth, so common that each researcher we studied identified it as a predictable marker on a mature person’s spiritual journey. This season is neither private failure nor personal discovery. It has a name, and millions of people across every century have felt it, gone through it, and survived it.
In other words, you’re not walking by yourself, and you’re not a hopeless case. On the contrary, you’re probably right on schedule. There is more ahead in this journey of faith development if we are willing to keep going. For all its pain and disruption, the mid-faith crisis of stage three does not have to signal the death of belief or spirituality. There is a pathway through, and a stronger, more settled life of faith on the other side.
You can order a copy of Mid-Faith Crisis now wherever you get your books!
Follow Catherine & Jason on social media to learn more about their work.
Catherine and I are both members of Redbud Writer’s Guild. You can learn more about that here. And you can check out the online publication here—
.What else is happening at We Have This Hope right now? Funny you should ask…
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I’m thrilled to see this. Thank you for reading and sharing, Emily.
So thankful for both of you!