John Ronald Reuel Tolkien was an English writer, poet, philologist, and academic who is best known for his high fantasy masterpieces The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. He was born on January 3, 1892, and died on September 2, 1973.
Tolkien's Catholicism and the conversion of C.S. Lewis. C. S. Lewis' conversion from atheism to Christianity was aided by Tolkien's Catholicism, though Tolkien was disappointed when Lewis opted to join the Church of England. He once wrote to Rayner Unwin's daughter Camilla, in response to her question on the meaning of life, that it was "to expand according to our ability our knowledge of God by all the means we have, and to be moved by it to praise and thankfulness." He had a specific devotion to the Blessed Sacrament, writing to his son Michael that it included "romance, grandeur, honour, faithfulness, and the genuine manner of all your affections upon earth, and more than that." As a result, he pushed his son Michael to receive Holy Communion on a regular basis, writing to him again that "the only medicine for drooping of fading faith is Communion." He felt the Catholic Church was authentic first and foremost because of the dignity and honor with which it holds the Blessed Sacrament. Tolkien fought liturgical reforms adopted during the Second Vatican Council, particularly the use of English for the liturgy, and continued to make the answers in Latin, loudly, and disregarding the rest of the congregation in the latter years of his life.
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