Unlike authors Catherine McNiel and Jason Hague, I didn’t grow up with an inherited faith. I can’t say that I’ve experienced the same kind of disappointment and disillusionment that they describe in their new book, Mid-Faith Crisis: Finding a Path Through Doubt, Disillusionment, and Dead Ends (InterVarsity Press, 2025).
Yet their book deeply resonates with me. I’ve had similar questions about once-admired Christian celebrities who are later revealed as abusers and sexual predators. I know people who have been so harmed by their church that they have never been back. People in later life whose faith has been changed by terrible suffering, who bravely carry on, yet privately lament that they have no one to talk to about their doubts.
Whether you’re going through some kind of mid-faith crisis of your own—facing doubt, disillusionment, and apparently dead ends—or if you know or serve alongside someone who is, this is a must-read book. I don’t say that at all lightly.
Mid-Faith Crisis is deeply personal as Catherine and Jason trace their respective stories of faith and struggle. It respectfully shares the experience of others confronting doubt, church harm, fallen heroes, and struggles with prayers that seem to go nowhere, with relentless suffering, with the collapse of long-held beliefs and feelings that fade. And most of all, their book points us beyond crisis to a deeper faith, by redefining faith, reimagining safe community, seeking spiritual companionship, and more.
Near the end of the book, the authors write:
It should be clear by now that crises of faith are normal and even necessary steps on the journey to spiritual maturity, but they are not fun, not easy to survive.
—Mid-Faith Crisis, 150
Then:
It is a long journey, friend. Faith is the trip, and the task, of a lifetime. We will become tired and discouraged. We will want to give up at times. Sometimes we will give up and need a hand or two to carry us for a while. Occasionally, we will need to sit down in the dust and ashes for a long, long time. But remember, real growth comes through winter and spring, dormancy and life, seasons of suffering and seasons of peace. New life comes from the garbage and death we have offered up to God and the long, slow process of time.
Even on those hard days, we do not walk alone. Rather, we walk together, and hope is free for the lending. We share our stories; we share reasons to stay on the path. And the goodness of the shepherd calls to us, urges us to keep moving, keep going, keep putting one foot in front of the other.
Let’s keep walking together, friend. Even when our strength runs out, perhaps our hope will not. And surely, we will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.
—Mid-Faith Crisis, 177
Disclosure: I’ve never met Jason Hague, but Catherine McNiel is part of my Redbud Writers Guild, and we were both part of The Message Women’s Devotional Bible, she as project manager and me as one of the many contributors. Thank you to InterVarsity Press for providing me with a complimentary copy of Mid-Faith Crisis (2025). As always, the choice to review and any opinions expressed are my own.
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