Adultery, Faith and Redemption: A Critical Analysis of Religion and the Perception of Adulterous Love through Sarah Miles in The End of the Affair
Author : M Comlan Appolinaire ADJAGBO, Dr. (MC) IBOURAHIMA BORO Alidou Razakou and Dr. (MC) Hergie Alexis
Abstract :
This article critically examines the complex interrelation between religion, adulterous love, and moral consciousness in Graham Greene’s The End of the Affair, with particular emphasis on the character of Sarah Miles. Specifically, it addresses the central problem of how Greene reconciles adultery traditionally condemned within Christian doctrine with the possibility of spiritual growth and redemptive suffering. To this end, drawing on critical perspectives advanced by George Orwell, David Lodge, and John Stratford, the study interrogates Greene’s sustained challenge to moral absolutism and his redefinition of sanctity through human failure. Thus, methodologically, the research adopts a Counter-Cross methodology, a critical framework that reads faith and sin, love and renunciation, not as binary oppositions but as intersecting and mutually illuminating forces. Accordingly, the article combines close textual analysis, theological criticism, and comparative literary reading across Greene’s Catholic novels. In particular, narrative voice, symbolism, and character psychology are examined in order to situate Sarah Miles within Greene’s broader moral and theological vision. The findings indicate that Greene deliberately destabilizes conventional moral judgments. Rather than presenting adultery as mere illicit desire or ethical deviation, The End of the Affair portrays it as a crucible through which faith is tested, intensified, and ultimately transformed. Consequently, Sarah Miles emerges as a paradoxical believer whose adulterous love leads not to moral collapse but to a painful and authentic encounter with God. The study therefore concludes that, in Greene’s fiction, sin frequently becomes the condition of grace and that religious meaning arises through contradiction, suffering, and moral ambiguity rather than through doctrinal clarity or ethical certainty.
Keywords :
Adultery, Faith, Sin, Redemption, Religion.
