Italian prime minister Giorgia Meloni and I have precious little in common. But one important thing we share is The Lord of the Rings. Both she and I regard the J.R.R. Tolkien trilogy as a personal “sacred text” which has profoundly shaped our values and our political commitments.
Speaking as a queer, leftist theologian, however, the tricky thing about sacred texts is this: when you come to them searching for echoes of your own beliefs, with a little digging you can usually find something.
