“I will remain Galadriel”

Monday Ministerial Musings

By Rev. Mark William Ennis

2022 Blog #33

August 22, 2022

Summer Cinema Scenes in 10 parts

Part 8 “The Lord of the Rings”

“I will remain Galadriel”

I first fell in love with JRR Tolkien’s “Lord of the Rings” when I was told about it in college. These stories were only in book form back then. The more recent movies were not thought of when I first discovered this three part story. I loved them then and I still love them.

The synopsis of the story is that there is an evil sorcerer who wants to dominate the world. The evil wizard, Sauron, lacks one thing to make this dream come true, the ultimate ring of power. This ring of power, by a long string of events, comes into the possession of Frodo, a meek and humble hobbit. A wise coalition of good wizards, humans, elves, dwarves and hobbits set about to destroy this one ring of power in order to keep it from the evil wizard.

Members of this coalition, as well as other characters, are tempted to seize this ring of power and use it in an attempt to topple the evil wizard. With good intentions, many characters face this temptation not knowing that possessing such power will change them into evil characters. One cannot have such power without it changing your character for the worse.

One such character is Galadriel, an Elf queen. She has been working to oppose the evil wizard and struggling to maintain all that is good in the world. She is a wise healer. Frodo, in order to end the evil of the world, with all good intentions, offers to give her the ring of power. He believes that she would use it with goodness and integrity to defeat the wizard Sauron. She declines this temptation for she fears what she shall become if she possessed unlimited power. She knows that her essence would change if she possessed this ring. Instead of being fair and just she would become an evil queen. The power would corrupt her.

Many of us desire more power to set things right in the world. There are times when we are tempted to adopt the philosophy “the end justifies the means.” When we adopt this way of thinking we begin a walk to the dark side.

Galadriel resists the temptation. She turns down the chance to have the ring. She would rather diminish than to become a powerful but evil queen. She knows the temptations of power. May we be so wise. When we battle evil forces in the world may we never use the same tactics of those doing evil or we might become like them and become evil ourselves.

The Lord of the Rings: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WeQDTj1UllA