| abstract
| - Unfaithful is a fifth season episode of House which first aired on February 16, 2009. When a priest who runs a homeless shelter sees a bleeding Jesus hovering at his doorstep, he is admitted to the ER. House takes on the case as a distraction for the team while he confronts Foreman and Thirteen about their relationship and tells them to split or quit. The team soon learns the priest had been involved in a molestation scandal that caused him to lose both his position and his faith. However, just as they are about to dismiss his case, the patient’s condition takes a drastic turn for the worse. House grapples with his past and his beliefs while trying to determine if Cuddy really wants him at Rachel’s naming ceremony. With respect to character development, the episode focuses on exploring House and his atheism. House has treated religious people in the past and has usually debated them vigorously (and not always respectfully) about the basic tenets of their faith. Here, he seems to find a kindred spirit - a person who has been religious in the past, but now has lost their beliefs (perhaps like House himself, who had a religious upbringing of sorts). However, even though the patient no longer believes in God, he’s equal to House’s challenge and pegs House as someone who desperately wants to believe - a challenge House quickly brushes off. In the end, when the patient regains his faith, House completely loses interest in him. In addition, House is given the opportunity to participate in Rachel Cuddy’s Jewish naming ceremony, and uses his atheism and his belief that all religion is hypocritical to dodge the invitation. The episode moves forward the Story Arcs of Huddy and Foreteen. House, and the audience, are kept guessing about Cuddy’s motives when she invites him to Rachel’s naming ceremony. In the end, we learn that Cuddy herself is uncertain whether she is trying to keep House from ruining an important occasion (either by isolating himself from the other partygoers or by making fun of the proceedings), or whether she really wants House to be involved in the life of both her and her daughter. Meanwhile, when Foreman and Thirteen face the choice of splitting or quitting, they have to face up both to how important working for House is to both of them and whether its important enough to risk splitting up their nascent relationship. In the end, they find a third option. The episode also explores several themes that appear frequently on the show. The patient, a priest who has apparently lost both his position and his faith for molesting a teenage boy, appears first to have a diagnosis that punishes him both for his sexual transgressions and his continuing deceptions in insisting that he has never had sex with anyone. However, like many patients with moral failings, his illness isn't related to his vices. More rarely, it turns out that the patient not only doesn't have moral failings, but instead is the victim of circumstances beyond his control. In many ways, Father Bresson is like House himself - losing everything that he cared about due to events for which he was not at fault. Unlike House, Father Bresson is redeemed and his faith is restored. However, we also see another parallel - House can't give up being a doctor for anything, and despite his lack of faith, Father Bresson can't give up being a priest. There is also another important parallel - they both have spent their careers being kicked around from job to job. Keeping with the religious theme of the episode, we also see that, once again, House is a Miracle Worker - diagnosing a serious illness in a patient everyone else was ready to discharge. Finally, O. Henry`s Gift of the Magi rears its head again as Thirteen and Foreman try to prove to the other that they are the one who is willing to give up the most to keep their relationship together.
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