[Religion] Unintentional Religion in Tolkien's works?

[Gandalf_theGrey]

Hail hildenyarvaEru,

Well met. * bows a greeting *

In support of your words, please allow me to simply cite the words of the Good Professor Tolkien himself, from Letter #213:

Or more important, I am a Christian (which can be deduced from my stories) and in fact a Roman Catholic. The latter "fact" perhaps cannot be deduced; though one critic (by letter) asserted that the invocations of Elbereth, and the character of Galadriel as directly described (or through the words of Gimli and Sam) were clearly related to Catholic devlotion to Mary. Another saw in waybread (lembas) = viaticum and the reference to its feeding the will and being more potent when fasting, a derivation from the eucharist. (That is: far greater things may color the mind in dealing with the lesser things of a fairy story.)

At your Service,

Gandalf the Grey