Clerical help... so to speak

[anoncat405]

I'm playing a cleric in a homebrew campaign who, by nature of the campaign and a generous DM, has shaky faith in their deity and a strained estrangement from their cloister, on the verge of a full-on crisis of faith. Since it definitely matters, the character is a LG cleric of the Death Domain and I'm currently leaning towards picking up some levels as a Circle of Spores druid (but I'll gladly take advice for builds or other secondary classes if anyone has better suggestions). I definitely want to dip into something that, thematically rather than mechanically, makes sense for the character so long as it doesn't double-down on the religious flavor like going paladin would, because it goes better with their questioning their belief.

Does anyone have any experience playing clerics or paladins going through a crisis of faith that isn't caused by something external like a cataclysm or literal acts of god(s)? I'm interested in anything from RP advice to gameplay tricks, anything would be of help!

[Unoriginal]

As I often say: in 5e, you're not a Cleric because you believe in a god, you're a Cleric because a god believes in you.

It's pretty easy to have a crisis of faith for internal reasons when you're basically made a miracle-worker whether you like it or not.

[Corran]

It's hard for me to try and give good rp advice without knowing more about more specific details of why your character's faith is shaky. But here is a suggestion. Having a shaky faith can certainly mean that in dire straits regarding matters of religion/faith, you could act either way. Meaning you could act as a devout follower is expected to do, or not (or anything in between but where's the fun in that?). Until your faith is restored fully, you are a time bomb. My advice? Roll it. Let the dice how your character acts.
Example that has some relevance. I was playing a shifter cleric of Erathis. Not lacking faith per se, but I was going for the beast within trope. Add to that the fact that the character had been pressed hard growing up to become the most disciplined and civilized version the clergy could make of him. So the character was a bit of a time bomb. Didn't show it, but the repressed wild animal instincts did exist. So a few times where I felt it was matching, I would make a roll to see if the character breaks loose, meaning he would go berserk-like and act in a way no priest of Erathis would. It never happened, but I particularly remember one time where there were a lot at stake.

A small town's -can't remember the name- people were in the brink of revolting against the mayor because the party had arrested an evil NPC. Town thought the mayor was bad, and that the evil NPC was the kindest person on earth. Party tries to convince the gathered crowd of what is really going on. My cleric -whom I was pretty much roleplaying as a cop- was organizing the few town guards who were terrified. His commands, aside for placing them in some formation, were along the lines of ''stay calm, don't draw weapons and don't attack unless you absolutely have to'', generally he tried to avoid an escalation on our part due to the NPC guards' inexperience and fear. An old woman sneaks(!) -DM's are jerks sometimes :p - by the rest of the pc's, she approaches undetected my character while he is trying to organize and discipline the npc guards, and slaps him. I knew what the best course of action was. But you know what, I freaking rolled it. The roll was good, so my character just growled and showed some teeth but managed to quickly restrain himself before doing something that would make this whole affair bloody.

Once again, having a crisis of faith means you are not exactly reliable when it comes to religious matters of your faith. Your actions on these subjects could very well be unpredictable. Letting the dice decide sometimes for you means that even the player can be surprised of how the character will act, which for some people can be very thrilling. Then you roleplay the consequences. My advice. Don't think on it too much. Improvise.

[Samayu]

Your characters faith and beliefs won't be called into question by his deity until he acts in a way that the deity won't appreciate. If he's still on the path, it won't matter whether it's on purpose or not.