Waugh wrote this after becoming a Roman Catholic. hence I think the protagonist's off page conversion near the end. However, though the thread of RC duty (and guilt) is woven though the whole story, one doesn't acquire the impression that the sacred portion of Ryder's memories are bound to the Christian faith but rather to his feelings and impressions of one or two of the aristocratic Flyte family. The sacred and Profane being one and the same. I often doubt that Waugh intended it this way. It's possible there was a difference between what the writer reasoned in his head and believed in his gut, and while his head may have written in certain religious plot points, the story lives and breathes with a different intention. In any case, the world and pleasures of pre-war Oxford has been wonderfully evoked;( as is the bitterness of Ryder's middle-age) If later in the book, Waugh was able to successfully instill a sense of spiritual revelation as well as the earlier worldly remembrances, this would of been one of the greatest books of all time. As it is, it's still very good.

Doomed and Decadent. With a capital D.