Lord of the Rings 2023: A Lenten Reading

As I mentioned last fall in this post about Ritual Participation, there is a blog dedicated to calendar readings of the Lord of the Rings each year during Lent.  Over the years I have done several annual readings, not every year, but sometimes for a few years in a row, such as when I returned to Lord of the Rings in 2016 (after absence of several years) and then read through The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings again in 2017 and 2018 (in audio format), followed by reading through the Lord of the Rings: One Volume Kindle edition during the first half of 2022.

It is nearing the start for the 2023 Lenten Lord of the Rings reading — it starts this coming Monday, February 13, with the first reading in the Prologue –On Hobbits, and other matters.   Over the next two months I’ll be reading per this schedule – a fast pace though do-able with a combination of audio and print versions.  Every reading it seems, brings out new considerations, great themes and devotional thoughts.  Since I’ve been getting an intro to Tolkien scholarship (Tolkien: A Celebration, and Following Gandalf, plus several podcast episodes of Amon Sul) as well this last year, it’ll be interesting to see what associations come to my mind, what new insights I’ll discover as I read it this time.

Check out this blog post with links to various devotionals from the first reading: many Lenten thoughts here, from the content of the prologue, regarding our comfort and being sheltered; perseverance; the things that define us; beginnings, and Calendars.

This recent essay from Joseph Pearce at The Imaginative Conservative, The Death and Resurrection of Bilbo Baggins, is also interesting — more particular to The Hobbit and Bilbo Baggins, but also fitting as about Hobbits and Bilbo’s character before and after his great adventure.

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