The Lord of the Rings (Abridged), Book III

	The hobbits arrive in Mordor. It’s nothing like what they were shown on the pamphlet, and much of it isn’t even built yet. Frodo and Sam are disappointed, and the tension threatens to cleave their friendship in two.
Sam	You promised me a beautiful honeymoon, and look where we are! Stinking marshes, bleak mountains, no wildlife, and countless English pubs full of shaven heads and football shirts. We might as well have stayed at home.
Frodo	The ‘Cock and Lion’ looks alright.
Sam	No! I’m sleeping outside tonight.
	Orcs cross the River Anduin into Gondor under the cover of night to sack Osgiliath.

"Is anyone actually in charge here?"

	Gandalf and Merry arrive in Gondor. Gandalf and Pippin. Merry. They prepare to defend Minas Tirith against an attack from Sauron’s ugliest army yet. They watch from the walls as legions of orcs approach.
Gondor Soldier #1	I say, William, they’ve got nothing on us. Look at our armor: shiny and lovely. Perfect spiffing gentlemen we are. And look at them. Disgusting!
Soldier #2	Mmm, quite.
	Meanwhile, Theoden and his army depart from Rohan. Desperate to fight, Merry is almost left behind, but is brought along at the last minute by some broad on a horse. Sorry, I meant Pippin.
Pippin	I have a pointy sword.
Broad on horse	I know, I wish you weren’t sitting behind me.
	Even more meanwhile, Aragorn, Gimli and Legolas are traipsing around some caves looking for a narrative device that will deliver Minas Tirith from certain doom with a swift blow of deus ex machina. They find it in an army of invincible ghost soldiers. Yep, first I'd heard of it too.
Ghost King	How do I know you’re not going to use us as a cop out by having us defeat all of Sauron’s armies, rather than just the handful or orcs running around outside Minas Tirith?
Aragorn	Don’t worry, there’s this convenient back story which means I’ll have to release you from your servitude after you liberate Minas Tirith, but before we go and attack Mordor proper. It’ll seem like a silly thing to do, but I didn’t write this.
	Orcs attacking Minas Tirith are slaughtered by ghost army.
Soldier #1	Look, William, didn’t even get my armor dirty. Don’t you think I look dashing with this flushed complexion and heavy breathing?
Soldier #2	Mmm, yes.
	Gollum tricks Frodo into thinking that Sam has been eating all their food. Frodo abandons Sam and decides to destroy the Ring by himself, which is funny, because so far Frodo hasn’t been able to do anything by himself. Usefully, Sam sits down and cries it out. Gollum leads Frodo into a dark cave…
Frodo	You know Gollum, I really am glad I trusted you. You’re a good friend…
Gollum	[Hiding, with echoing voice] Yes, hobbit…. [Laughs]
Frodo	Gollum? Gollum?! Where are you?
	Frodo is stung by a giant spider. Had he not immediately become paralyzed, he would have said this…
Frodo	At least Gollum had nothing to do with this.
	Tear ducts empty, Sam decides he’s not a little weenie after all and goes to help Frodo. Thinking Frodo is dead, he manages to remove the Ring from Frodo right before a band of orcs find him and carry his inert body away. In hiding, Sam overhears them discussing the fact that Frodo is still alive. Lucky they were discussing this in English, a language that Sam understood, and not their own native Mordor tongue, which Sam couldn’t speak. Yes, very lucky. Sam rescues Frodo.
Frodo	Thanks for rescuing me Sam! Shame the orcs got the Ring. I was really looking forward to hiking up Mount Doom, avoiding all of those orcs, chucking it into the fire, and not making it out alive. Oh well, guess we’d better head back to the Shire.
Sam	Not so fast! I have the Ring! I took when I thought you were dead.
Frodo	Oh… Yay. Great job. Woo. Now we get to go to Mount Doom. I was so worried there for a minute, you know, that we wouldn’t get to, because the Ring was gone. Awesome.
	Aware that there hasn’t been an epic battle seen for at least five minutes, Aragorn decides to attack Mordor with his vastly inferior forces.
Aragorn	Today we fight for Frodo!
All	For Frodo!
Legolas	Frododo!
	Meanwhile, Frodo and Sam approach Mount Doom.
Frodo	I wonder where Gollum is.
	Gollum appears from behind a boulder and throws a stone at Sam’s head.
Frodo	Oh, there he is.
	Frodo runs up the slope and into Mount Doom to destroy the Ring.
Gollum	No, Master Hobbit! Give it to me! Don’t destroy the Precious!
Frodo	Look, Gollum, I’ve trusted you so far because you’ve never given me reason to do otherwise. But I really think this is something that needs to happen.
Gollum	[Jumps on Frodo’s back, bites his finger off and steals the Ring] Ah ha! It’s mine! The Precious!
Frodo	What’s this? Betrayal? What are the odds?!
	Gollum falls in the fires of Mount Doom, destroying the Ring. Mordor sort of implodes. Sam and Frodo chill on a rock in the middle of a stream of lava awaiting rescue.

"That went well."

Sam	You know who else had a gay name?
Frodo	Hmm?
Sam	Tom Bombadil.
Frodo	Oh yeah, I forgot about that guy. You know who I miss?
Sam	Who?
Frodo	Gollum. He had a good heart.
	A group of giant eagles rescue Frodo and Sam, who are at this point too tired to note that these birds might have come in handy earlier. Aragorn is crowned King of Gondor.

"Maybe I'll let them vote one day... Nah."

	The hobbits return to the Shire to find that Saruman has escaped from Isengard to enslave the Shire. Chronic voter apathy among hobbits means that most haven't even noticed.
Sam	I don't remember this part.
Frodo	Yeah, it surprised me too. Say, good woman, what news of Hobbiton?
Hobbit woman	What? Who are you? Oh yeah... you're them four 'obbits what went off adventuring, leavin' us 'ere to our own devices. But I thought ya was all male, if ye know what I'm sayin'.

	The hobbits foster an uprising against Saruman and his lunatic policy of 'industrialization'. Saruman is betrayed and killed by Wormtongue, who is in turn slain by archers working for Al Gore.
Archer	What an inconvenient poof.
	Frodo and Sam consummate their friendship, and by that I mean their friendship is consummate. Frodo tires of his mortal life and sails west into the Undying Lands. Presumably that means a land where people are undying, since lands don't really die, and that would just be redundant. I guess it could just be called 'Lands'. The Shire returns to normal and never industrializes thanks to vast oil reserves discovered under local hobbits' fields. It remains largely unchanged to this day. That is to say, Heaven.

Theocracy, not Theocrazy

Secularism. A word designed by secularists, for secularists. A word intended to conjure visions of noble men in silk stockings, and the civil equality their valiant slaves will one day enjoy only two hundred years later. But what is good about a system that imprisons its leaders in marble while still alive and turns them into public monuments?

Proponents of a separate church and state often give us the impression that it’s an unequivocal good. Yet as we know that the only absolute good is Frodo Himself, how can anything else be? Accordingly, we can conclude that the separation of church and state must have its faults, and since it’s widely touted by atheists, those deceitful worshipers of the brain-god Thinky, we can expect its failings to beguile us and couch themselves in the language of the common good.

The most obvious problem with secularism is that it’s a relatively young, upstart theory, and as such it has yet to earn our trust. Theocracies on the other hand have been around for centuries, and the nations that gave birth to them are more or less still in one piece: Byzantium, for example, is much of modern Turkey.

Similarly, based on such rigid, unbending, unchanging, and unprogressive dogma, theocracies are guaranteed to be politically stable. If fornication was immoral one thousand years ago, chances are it still is! This ensures that the nation’s laws are easier to learn, and guarantees a longer shelf life for guidebooks. 

Popularity is generally a good indication of the suitability of political systems, and theocracies were wildly popular with people of all stripes long before they were given such trivial things as the vote, free speech, and the resulting ability to indicate otherwise. In addition, Sweden and Finland are some of the most secular states on the planet, yet they get pitifully little sunlight during the winter. The correlation is certainly suggestive!


These are also suggestive. Words are fun.

Critics of theocratic rule note that they can be troubled by competing religious and state jurisdictions. More like double the justice, I say! Studies also indicate that civil servants work more effectively when threatened with eternal damnation as opposed to a negative quarterly performance review.

Easily convinced of the benefits of theocracy, as I’m sure you are by now, I would next like to submit that Frodo is the Messiah to take the reigns of power. Though critics argue his arms are too short for the job, Jesus’ are almost certainly too dead for the job. In addition, Frodo is widely known to have been a cunning statesman, inspiring many to study his political panache. Indeed, Otto von Bismarck is thought to have been a Frodologist.

"No civilization other than that which is Christian, is worth seeking or possessing."

Well that’s clearly the wrong quote. Regardless, we must recognize that if it is the state that gives us our rights, it can easily take them away. But if we get our rights from Frodo, we are safe in the knowledge that they are subject to the strict interpretation of unelected religious officials. Who always have our best interests in mind. Did I neglect to mention that? And under theocratic rule, our enemies and members of other faiths never get rights in the first place. Remember, it’s only persecution if you hear about it!

So, dear reader, next time you’re stirred unwelcome from your apathy and asked to vote, choose the option that will ensure you never need set foot in a claustrophobic voting booth again.

Frodo claims the maelstrom

A series of earthquakes in the vicinity of Yellowstone National Park over the past few weeks has given geologists and unqualified, speculating laymen pause for thought, as debate abounds as to who or what is responsible. Experts are nearing consensus on the opinion that the low impact ground tremors are merely the Will of God, and have largely dispelled speculation as to a solely natural cause.

“Tectonic plate movements are frequently used by Jehovah to demonstrate his displeasure,” explained Yellowstone-based scientist, Rick Cavendish. Occurring as they did in late December and early January, the tremors are thought to have had something to do with the approaching inauguration of President Barrack Obama. Cavendish speculated that while God has been happy to have white men sit upon the throne in the United States for the past couple of centuries, He is now expressing anger at the election of a white man with a highly exaggerated suntan. “The Almighty is no fan of gamma rays,” noted Cavendish.

Scientists have been attributing a range of weather conditions to God's Will for several decades now. Explained eminent meteortheologist Gerald Spade, “we now believe avalanches convey God's infinite impatience, and lightning to be an expression of His excitement, sexual or otherwise.”

The conclusion of the meteortheological school is however far from uncontroversial. Traditional meteorologists, for example, have always held that hurricanes are a manifestation of God's anger, while lightning is merely a source of idle entertainment, not unlike playing with a Zippo, or perhaps his dong. Indeed, God has amassed so much of the Vietnamese currency that the central bank is having to issue millions of new banknotes into circulation.

In 2005, scientists nearly came to blows over Hurricane Katrina, which some attributed to the increasing popularity of sodomy, while others pointed out that gay sex rates had changed little over the preceding ever. Meanwhile, displaced residents of New Orleans were happy for the experts to decipher the meaning behind the storm before being rehoused. “Oh, I don't really mind, honey,” opined laundry owner Shaneqwa Matthews in August of that year. “We gots to know why God's making us suffer before they get us outta these army-issued cots, you know what I'm sayin'?”

(click to enlarge, unless you don't care, then screw it)

Certain meteortheological phenomenons have so far been unattributable to the On High, however, and in the lull other deities have spoken up to claim them for themselves. Norse god Odin was reportedly pleased at having secured the flurry for himself, but has since taken flak for choosing the "sissiest of the storms," according to Thor, a casual acquaintance. The Messiah Frodo on the other hand was quick to take responsibility for the maelstrom, a type of ocean whirlpool long feared by sailors and the type of hysterical cruise ship traveler that has no appreciation for how rare they are. Since it was a maelstrom that sank Captain Nemo's submarine the Nautilus at the end of Jules Verne's historical account, 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, it is open to speculation whether Monsieur Verne was himself a Frodologist.

Interestingly, due to the recent reemergence of a lost poem recounting Frodo's legendary slaying of the Kraken, scholars have begun to ponder whether the maritime connection is merely a coincidence, or perhaps representative of some unknown facet of Frodological lore.

The debate continues, and witnesses of other nautical events involving the Messiah Frodo are meanwhile encouraged to report them to their local Fro'Moe without delay.

Tangentially relevant octopus art

A few weeks ago I drew a picture in tribute to PZ Myers, beloved heathen blogger of Pharyngula, depicting a cephalopod battling a gaggle of orcs. Since it is self-evidently a masterpiece of crudely drawn monochrome crossover artwork, it would be a shame to allow the world to be a lesser place for never having seen it. Also, there was no cartoon in my previous post.


"Child of Frodo"

Click to enlarge (and then some)


Frodo be with you all.

What does it mean to have a personal relationship with Frodo?

Since starting this website one of our most frequently received questions from both Frodologists and convert-hopefuls alike is the nature of followers’ relationship with Frodo, praise Him. “What does it mean to have a personal relationship with Him?” they ask. “How is my relationship with Frodo different than my relationship with the Christian God, or the Teletubbies?” others wonder.

While there are satirically-convenient similarities, each follower’s personal relationship with his Lord is quite different to one a Christian might have with his Jesus. It’s better too.

To really understand how a Frodologist communicates with Frodo, and opens his heart in so doing, this article has been laid out in the format of a series of questions.

How can I talk to Frodo?

You can talk to Frodo all the time! Best of all, it’s completely up to you how to do it. Most Frodologists prefer to do it silently, in their head. But if you feel full of faith, you’re free to talk to him out loud as well. You should be warned, however, that since a handful of Frodologists have been pelted with eggs whilst openly praying to Frodo on public transportation, vocal conversations with Him carry their risks.

How is that different than talking to myself?

Talking to yourself is not officially sanctioned by the Faith, and it’s something you can do on your own time.

Will Frodo respond to me?

It is important to remember that Frodo is one of the busiest deities there is, and he may not respond to you. Alternatively, some theologians believe Frodo may have lost the faculty of speech after all these years.

Accordingly, the Council of Fro’Moes have adopted the divinely revealed Doctrine of Silent Assent. This means that should Frodo not respond to a believer’s prayer, the believer can assume that Frodo gives his blessing to the request. In the spirit of the Doctrine, the Fro’Moe’Co was able to adopt it when they submitted it in proposal form to Frodo, asked for his approval, and heard nothing. What a truly fascinating study in applied theology!

This illustrates a key difference between Frodology and other faiths. While other religions might distinguish between wishes (which aren’t granted) and prayers (which are), Frodo simply grants nothing!

On the rare occasion that Frodo does respond to you, contact your local Fro’Moe immediately, as it is vital that the Faith is able to guide you, and not leave you to decipher His Divine Word alone. Also, you will shortly be committed to an institution. It is our experience that Frodo never responds, so you’re probably just mentally ill.

How do I know if He’s listening?

It can sometimes be tricky to distinguish between the Doctrine of Silent Assent and not being heard, but Frodologists can take comfort in the knowledge that Frodo can always hear you. What evidence do we have of that, you ask? Why, it’s right in the definition of “omniscience”! If Frodo is omniscient, then he is aware of everything at all times. It’s as simple as this nice, smooth, Ring of Power-shaped logic.

How do I ask forgiveness?

You can ask forgiveness for a whole raft of crimesins, from adultery through to things you suspect aren’t even sins! Additionally, the Frequent Prayer Program means that repeat offenders can streamline the forgiveness process. In combination with the DSA, the FPP (which was adopted via the DSA) means that the atonement procedure is far quicker than it is in other faiths. So if you feel like sticking it to the neighbor’s wife five nights out of seven, this might just be the religion for you! After all, since Frodo saw fit to make us all feckless crimesinners, it’s a mark of His beneficence that He afforded us this concession.

What do I get from praying to Frodo?

Frodo can give you comfort with His silence. Like the sense of peace you can only get from white noise, or perhaps that disturbing suffocating sensation you get when you enter a sound-proofed room, the complete quiet of an answered prayer gives succor to all believers.

Truly, Frodo has earned his motto, “be neither seen nor heard.”

Do I get to have sex with Frodo?

Frodo is thought to have had an extremely small penis, which would almost certainly leave modern women unsatisfied. This is of course a sign of His holy sanctity, as the female orgasm is a manifestation of Evil. His inability to cause them, even with his stubby little fingers, is surely a sign of His purity.

More questions? Then send 'em in!

Frodo and the Kraken

Throughout human history tales of terrible beasts lying in wait beneath the waves have long inspired fear in the hearts of the hardiest sailors. But it is the legendary Kraken which truly gripped men’s hearts and shook from them every last drop of courage. Indeed, the terror occasioned by sharing the wide open sea with the infamous mythological monster is thought to have been rivaled only by the prospect of spending a night with a syphilitic St. Malo prostitute. Legend has it they were total dogs.

Some notable skeptics such as the Pope argue against the existence of this mercurial creature on the basis that its appearance in the annals is rare and inconsistent. Yet not even the staunchest of disbelievers can deny that sightings have sea monsters span from the time of Homer through to the present day.

By the 19th Century however, sightings of the beast had ceased. Sailors no longer feared wide expanses of ocean, and instead began to ponder all the fabulous, nubile sea nymphs they could stick their penises in. When gloating seaman put paid to their fantastical stories of mermaids by bringing home Steller's sea cow, France was alone in fielding an impressive batch of eager new naval recruits.

So what happened in the 18th Century to end the sightings and put mariners at ease? Had the Kraken merely grown quiet over the years then one would expect sailors to fear the oceans still, rather than confidently stab the seas with their pointy prows as they do. Frodological lore offers a compelling explanation in the form of an epic poem dating from 1783. Though only scraps remain, it tells the harrowing tale of a French frigate returning from Louisiana being ambushed and hounded by a mighty tentacled beast, dubbed by the author as 'le Cracquen'. But when all hope was lost, the author tells of the incredible appearance of a winged apparition, 'le Frodo', who slays le Cracquen and saves le petrified crew.

Here then is an excerpt depicting the appearance of Frodo and his climactic battle with the Kraken, translated from the original French.

Frodo and the Kraken

And lo! ye prow did suffer seas
The squall a rage which cloaked the beast
Our hearts were doused with brackish spray
And feared the more the violent fray

Aware we would be torn apart
By beast so vile and cold of heart
My soul did quake and spirit fear
The maw of Death that was so near

So piteous it found our plight
Resist as futile as take flight
Our vessel captained by Despair
Ensure it did our courage rare

So sure were we of Death's embrace
Beyond belief was His great grace
Yet from on High He did appear
With noble brow and fiery spear

Agape we watched and did behold
Our Lord and Master craft in gold
Aloft He soared with harpoon heft
And with a stroke its heart was cleft

And just as light destroys the dark
The beast was slain before the ark
And lo! it sank beneath the seas
The squall no more, it too deceased

For joy and praise our tears did flow
To glory in our Master's glow
As one we knelt now saved from foe
And shouted thrice All Hail Frodo!

Enroll for your MSc in Anfrodology today!

It is my pleasure to introduce you to one of the most exciting new disciplines in academia today. The study of anfrodology examines the origins of hobbits, and studies the journey of these scrappy little creatures through life. The subject asks whether development is progressive, and whether hobbits are the pinnacle of creation, before quickly answering both questions in the affirmative.

In some ways anfrodology is a 'new' subject. For example, no one had heard of it before it was created out of thin air a few hours ago. But at the same time, it's also a very 'old' subject, in the sense that we can make up history too.

Few universities offer the degree, and even fewer employers recognize it, so you'll be entering an exclusive club by enrolling. But hold on! Don't take my word for it. Browse the curriculum and multitude of benefits to studying for a master's degree in anfrodology, then take my word for it.

Curriculum

Fun fact! The word 'curriculum' comes from the Latin curriculum, which means 'cucumber' in English.

1. In the first semester, students will take a philosophy of science module which encourages them to challenge their preconceptions. The class, 'Everything you learned about evolution in high school was wrong (and you're a bad person too)', prepares students for the rigors of participating in scarcely credible seminars and stretching their trust in their teachers to near Christian proportions.

2. Concurrently, students enrolling for Autumn 2009 will be the final class to take the module 'The Origins of Woman', in which they will discover the shocking truth that she is the result of a chance mutation from a turnip. Since she has plateaued developmentally ever since, a concept science calls 'stagnation', woman will not feature at all in future syllabi. Syllabye bye!

3. Students will then take the highly popular module, 'Turnips - Our Intellectual Inferiors?' During the course of study they will learn exciting Truths such as the progressive nature of development, aided by an archaic looking 19th Century Pyramid of Life learning companion.



Fun Fact! If it can't be depicted triangularly, it can't be true.

4. In the second year (surprise, there's a second year!) students will be foremost concerned with a module called 'Pure Blind Chance - Secondary Deity and Motor of Change'. Considered a highlight of the course, students learn how development is entirely the result of randomness and luck. Learning to properly worship Chance as a servant of Frodo absorbs much of students' time, but through doing so they learn how it is responsible for all of life's creations, and discover why no transitional fossils such as Australopithecus or Homo habilis exist.

5. Learning in the second year is augmented by seminars on 'Theories are the Worst Kind of Science'. Students are taught how the rules described by any theory could easily change at any time, as soon as next week, because by definition theories are unproven. The seminars involve a thought experiment, which encourages students to imagine a system whereby creatures slowly develop across millennia through a passive selective mechanism, resulting in the continued propagation of certain species due to the suitability for life of observable random mutations. Through suspending their disbelief via this absurd example, students learn how the natural laws governing the universe could easily be different.

Fun fact! Increasing paragraph length is a sign of poor planning.

6. In the second semester, students learn how natural mechanisms should dictate their ethical creed in the module 'Morality - Slaying the Fickle Beast'. Students must complete an end of year project, which consisted last year of helping the Malayan lesser crested warbler into early endangerment to make more room for the Malayan greater crested warbler.

7. The final module, a case study on irreducible complexity, teaches students how to apply what they have learned in the real world. In previous years, students have had to write theses on the irreducible complexity of each stage in the evolution of the eye: from a single photosensitive cell, through a collection of such cells, to the development of 'pinhole camera' eyes, protective lenses, and ending with the multicellular complex ocular organs of hobbits. That's a lot of irreducible complexity!

But wait, there's more!

Anfrodology degrees feature additional benefits that other subjects don't share. For example, anfrodology students get the opportunity to travel to the Gondor-Mordor border for excavation work. Due to recent political developments, there is currently an abundance of fresh proto-fossils, a biological compound not unlike a corpse.

Also, scripture reading is heavily encouraged. We consider it a type of 'distance learning', because it challenges students to see how far away they can get from observable reality before they stop making sense.

What you'll get from studying with us

• Reinforcement of your opinions and an offended sense of self-righteousness whenever anyone contradicts you
  
• Next to no life experience outside the subject itself
  
• Herpes, thanks to the campus-wide ban on condoms

Frequently Asked Questions

Every faith finds itself at that point in time where it is pinned by its believers' increasingly paranoid questions against the rock of its own exposure. It's crunch time. Do you stick to your story, or admit there was a sperm involved? Is it possible you got the age of the Earth wrong, or can you successfully dismiss 4 1/2 billion years of rocks with a wave of the hand?

For Frodology, that time is at hand. Here then, are our twenty most frequently asked questions.

1. Why did Frodo and Sam have to trek all the way to Mordor when Gandalf had that allegiance with the Eagles? They flew them away, why not fly them there?

The eagle is a proud creature of the order Minor Background Characters. It is remarkable for its habit of showing up when a protagonist has painted himself into a corner from which it is impossible to escape, without him dying of course. A single eagle raises between two and three young simultaneously, and its nest is known as an 'aerie'.

2. Boromir lugged that heavy shield all the way from Gondor only to forget it when he was shot in the chest with three arrows, arguably the time when he needed it most. What gives?

There is actually only paltry evidence that his leather bound, studded bronze shield even was a shield. Apart from using the shield as a shield to fight goblins and the cave troll in the Moria mines, no further mention is made of the shield-like object. Its shield-like appearance is therefore thought to be only a coincidence, and it is far more likely that the shield was actually a pillow, or perhaps a fruit bowl.

3. Eowyn is said to have killed the Witch King leader of the Ringwraiths. How is this possible when we now know that she was a woman?

We now live in an enlightened age where misogyny and sex discrimination are not tolerated. Women are perfectly capable of accomplishing things when they are given help by others, just as Eowyn was helped to kill the Witch King by the hobbit Merry.

4. The demon that drags Gandalf from the bridge of Kazad-Dum and battles him to the summit of a mountain is made from fire and shadow. I didn't know fire and shadow could do that.

That's not really a question.

5. The ents eventually leave the forest to bring hell upon the evil wizard Saruman at Isengard, but only after they let an army escape, one that later kills a lot of people. Why didn't they do something sooner?

Ents are a type of tree, and it is widely considered miraculous by Frodologists that they "did" anything at all.

6. When Gandalf, Elrond and Frodo 'sail into the West' at the end of the final book, where exactly are they going?

At this point in time, it was not known that the globe was spherical, so presumably they thought they were sailing to the end of the Earth, or the 'Undying Lands'. Cirdan, the elven shipwright, had never left his home port and would not have known that they would merely end up several thousand miles East of where they started. He would later lose his shipwright's license and purchase a Radio Shack franchise.

7. I find myself attracted to the character of Grima Wormtongue. Is there something wrong with me? What if he looks like my middle school PE teacher?

There is nothing wrong with you. Grima was a handsome individual, widely loved for his greasy black hair, pale, watery eyes, and ghostly complexion. Frodo teaches us to follow love where we find it. If that happens to be your PE teacher, then who is to stop you, other than the law and your teacher's contract of employment?

8. After installing a new hard drive, Windows freezes on the login screen and won't even accept my password. Is that supposed to happen?

Ensure your drive is set to 'slave' mode. Frodo teaches that great deeds are possible through enslavement.

9. Gandalf says that Gollum evolved from a river person, a creature not unlike a hobbit. How is that possible when we know evolution is false?

Gollum was an unholy, evil creature, and evolution is an unholy, evil theory. Poetically it's fitting, provided you don't trouble yourself over the how.

10. Don't you think Glorfindel is a pretty gay name?

I do.

11. You criticize Christians who think that their god created the world from an infinite supply of silly putty, but you believe that a bunch of sky fairies sang the world into existence. What the fuck does that even mean?

We now think that 'sang' is a metaphor for 'allowed to occur through natural processes'.

12. In The Fellowship of the Ring, the group bands together and glories in killing a troll, when it's clearly an endangered species. Isn't that kind of wrong?

Not if you consider that the animal's endangerment is punishment for its evildoing, notwithstanding its inability to comprehend the concepts of guilt, punishment, justice, or evil. It's all part of Frodo's plan.

13. At the very beginning, Sauron is killed when Isildur merely chops off a few of his fingers. Is he a hemophiliac or something?

Scientists nowadays think it was more the shock that killed Sauron, rather than the loss of a few fingers. The sudden pain sent his adrenal gland into overdrive, which gave him a heart attack and caused his body to, uh, evaporate. These things happen.

14. It's a huge deal when Elrond reforges Narsil, "the Sword that was Broken" and convinces Aragorn to wield it, proving he's King of Gondor. But if it was broken, it's clearly not a very good sword, is it?

We believe that Aragorn wanted to have someone else to blame if the sword broke again. It's a concept known as 'delegating responsibility'.

15. At least four people wear the Ring and go invisible: Isildur, Gollum, Bilbo, and Frodo. But when Sauron wears it, all it does is make him look like he's married. Was Sauron married?

Oh, I, um, was expecting a different question... Well, records suggest that despite his many minions, Sauron lived a fairly lonely life. The closest you could say is that Sauron was 'married' to the Ring. The analogy is apt, as Sauron was willing to enslave and torture while under his spouse's corrupting influence.

16. In the film when Sam and Frodo walk through Mordor, we see hundreds of thousands of orcs, but no visible means of supporting them. Where are the farms and shops? Did they even have irrigation?

Viewers have received a distorted view of Mordor from watching the film, seeing as they did only the barren scrub land of North Mordor. The orcs marshaling there had traveled a great distance from their homes in South Mordor, or Mesomodoria, a region largely ignored by Tolkien, but famed for its agricultural bounty and culture. We still hate them though.

17. Gandalf is thousands of years old and enormously wise, and yet still has to google "gold ring makes wearer invisible" to discover that Bilbo is in possession of the One Ring. Shouldn't he be better at his job?

That's a little unfair on Gandalf. Googling is a legitimate element of most office jobs these days, and is generally what lawyers are referring to when they speak of "research". Furthermore, the Wikipedia page on the One Ring was only a stub when Gandalf began his search.

18. Sauron's tower only has one all seeing eye. Doesn't that interfere with his depth perception?

Absolutely. In fact, when Frodo first dons the Ring whilst staying at a tavern in Bree, Sauron could be seen madly swinging his sword on the steps of his dark tower, thousands of miles away. Orcs embarrassed by their leader's klutzy discoordination are said to have deserted Sauron in droves at this point.

19. Why do the Black Gates open outwards? Wouldn't it be better if it was called the Black Cupboard?

Um... no.

20. Gondor and Mordor have been fighting over the same patch of dirt for yonks. Wouldn't it have been in both their interests to establish a power sharing agreement with a rotating leadership, under the supervision of a neutral third party?

Gondor benefits from thriving wartime industries. It is widely known as a manufacturer of quality armor, and but for the aid it desperately solicits from Rohan in times of conflict, Gondor's economy would likely suffer. That and all of Mordor is stupid and evil. All of it. Every last conscious being. Would you share power with them?

The good thing about an FAQ is that nowhere in the title does it say that questions are going to be adequately answered.

The Ten Suggestions – Part I

It is no secret that Christians like to be told in no uncertain terms what to do by a trusted authority figure, much like a child is easily led into the back of a windowless van outside his school. Frodologists, however, prefer to be cajoled and persuaded. It is this free-wheeling, ‘hobbitesque’ attitude that the Faith has wholeheartedly come to embrace, after many, many centuries of brutally trying to suppress it.

For this reason, Frodo’s Law is generally distilled not into rigid dogma, but into ten practical, easily-swallowed suggestions. The Suggestions are subdivided into five Fro-dos and five Fro-don’ts.

First is the list of Fro-dos, straight from the horse’s mouth. And by that, I mean Frodo’s mouth. Frodo isn’t a horse. That was just a saying, you know. I just want to be clear on that.

Fro-dos

1. You shall take a hobbit surname.

Some Frodologists may find it inconvenient to comply with this, or simply not want to. If that’s the case, it’s perfectly alright. You still have to do it though. Perhaps you expected me to say something different judging by the content of the previous sentence. Well, that’s irony for you.


2. Keep your ears pointy and your feet hairy.

The reference to pointy ears is thought to express the importance of remaining aware of the enemy’s plans and movements, and gaining as much information as possible.

The reference to hairy feet is thought to be a ban on shaving one’s feet.


3. You shall think in terms of oversimplified dichotomies.

This really does make life easier. Here are a few favorites that may aid in streamlining your life:

• Good v. Evil
  
• East v. West
  
• Democrat v. Republican
  
• Fruit v. Vegetable
  
• Male v. Female

Fig. 1, A hermaphroditic snail has no place in Frodo's world


4. Do your utmost to bring the Word of Frodo to the Heathen.

Perhaps the most effective way to do this is by wasting as much of their time as possible blogging. Endless circular arguments and frequent use of logical fallacies are particularly effective for preoccupying atheists. We have also had notable success converting Christians with the bendy pencil trick.


Fig. 2, Some Christians may take longer to break with this method than others, but they all cave eventually


5. Take offense to nearly everything and portray yourself as persecuted as frequently as possible.

Skillfully practiced, you can be both intolerant of other faiths and easily offended at the same time. Please feel free to follow in Bill Donohue’s footsteps and label any of the following “hate speech”:

• Any suggestion that at some point in time someone was killed in Frodo’s name, followed by an insinuation that it was a bad thing
  
• If people profess to worship deities which are clearly made up, like the Invisible Pink Unicorn, the Flying Spaghetti Monster, Odin, or Richard Dawkins
  
• The placement of a discreet poster within eyeshot of a Frodological symbol which suggests that Frodologists might be incorrect in their beliefs
  
• The proposal that two persons of the same gender might one day be married
  
• The labeling of you as ‘jowly’

Check back soon for Part II, Five Fro-don'ts!

A Treatise on the True Story of December 25th

Over the years, traditions and holidays evolve. Even religious ones that are organized by people dead set against evolution and everything it stands for – they evolve too. When people are asked what “the true meaning of Christmas” is these days, respondents often focus too hard on trying to remember the details, like whether Scrooge owned the inn that turned Mary away, or the one that let her stay in the stable. Many worry themselves trying to remember which gift each wise man brought, and forget the real message, which is that giving expensive presents to a newborn is guaranteed to spoil him.

Some people lose sight of the bigger picture while watching straight-to-DVD movies, and forget all about treatises.

However, there is an altogether different message associated with December 25th, which predates the Christmas story, and even the film A Christmas Story. Arguably the event is all the more important as it actually happened on December 25th, unlike subsequent events which are wrongly and inexplicably commemorated on that day.

To Frodologists, December 25th is Fellowship Day. It commemorates that day when Frodo and his eight companions set off from Rivendell to destroy the Ring and deliver Middle Earth from evil. There are, I think, four lessons which can be drawn from the bold step taken on December 25th.

First, the mission to Mordor is symbolic of casting off the yoke of our material possessions. The ring which Frodo takes is a piece of jewelry highly evocative of Western materialism, and he swears on all that’s holy (himself) that he will cast it into the fires of the predictably named Mount Doom. As Robert Frost belatedly observed several millennia later, “nothing gold can stay”. Unless it wasn’t infused with preternatural evil at the time it was cast from hellfire and the ethereal souls of unbaptized children. Then it can stay.

The second message that Frodologists take from Fellowship Day is that on any arduous quest or journey, at the halfway point a tall elvish woman will give you queer gifts you likely have no use for. This is a device which literature calls deus ex machina, and it demonstrates the extreme and incredible good fortune which one should always expect and count on.

Third, Fellowship Day teaches us important lessons about cooperation in the face of faceless evil. Namely, it teaches us to judge others based on rumors and hearsay, and to accuse entire cultures of being paragons of evil, particularly if they lay far to the east. It teaches us to ignore the root causes of strife, and to expend countless lives sorting out a disagreement when a little dialogue may have been just as effective.



Finally, Fellowship Day teaches us about friendship. In particular we learn the lesson that, despite brave assurances of support from friends and strangers alike, no one will actually offer to do the hardest part for us, no matter how much more suited they are for the task. Ultimately, putting a miniature flag on your dashboard or uploading a series of JPEGs to the sidebar of your blog is much easier.

With so much to teach the rest of the world, however, we Frodologists must remember never to detract from other messages symbolized by the 25th of December. In particular, if you are heavily pregnant and desperately implore people for a room all the while maintaining your chastity and virginity, no one is going to let you in.

Merry Christmas!

In the know: should we just stop using our brains?

Perched atop of our bodies like a crown as it is, the brain has long fascinated man. That is until he lays down, at which point it’s no higher than anything else on his body and he can become fascinated with his sex organ. But for the most part, the brain is the pinnacle of our corporeal selves, and for this reason it is thought to be greatly deserving of study.

The brain was first discovered by cavemen in 12,116 BC in a game of “rock-head”, a primitive recreational activity which required participants to fling rocks of various sizes at each other’s heads. In actual fact, however, cavemen were previously unable to distinguish between rocks and heads, and so the game’s name is better translated as “rock-rock”, or “head-head”. Scientists believe it is this same basic misunderstanding of anatomy that causes rams to lock horns and butt heads.

It was however not until the middle of the 18th Century that a use was finally discovered for the brain. For several weeks in the summer 1731 it became wildly popular among European monarchs to use gray matter compote as a primitive weather sealant. Though seasonal rains proved it expensive and ineffective, it was not until Thompson’s Water Seal became commercially available in the early 20th Century that this use of brains was finally discontinued.

By the early 19th Century, the actual use of the brain had been discovered. Early scientists were perplexed by its similarity to the walnut, leading many to think that trees were much smarter than us. When man returned to the surface from his burrow two generations later, civilization more or less returned to normal.

Only very recently has the more sinister purpose of the brain been discovered. Frodologist scientists have reason to believe that the brain is actually the principle medium by which atheists pray to their brain-god, Thinky. That this took so long to discover is somewhat embarrassing to scientists; in retrospect, atheists' appeals to “reason” and “logic” are transparent proselytizing on behalf of their deity. But most importantly, theologians wonder, are we angering Frodo every time we use our brains by appearing to worship Thinky?

Scientists are now scrambling around for an answer. After all, we can’t just remove our brains.

Can we?

No, it would seem we cannot. Frankenstein’s monster is misleading on that front and only goes to demonstrate the dangers of believing in fiction! So, if we can’t remove them, how can we turn them off?

Preliminary research suggests that it is possible and recommends the power of the mass synchronized chant: F… R… O-D-O, F… R… O-D-O … When it’s over, it’ll be hours later and chanters will remember nothing.

Frodologist scientists expect that through this program participants will soon become avid consumers of mass market t-shirts and bumper stickers.



Salvation rides a Wagoneer

Prophecy wrongly predicts own fallibility

Frodologist scholars were flabbergasted yesterday, when, during a routine reexamination of a religious text for clues as to Frodo’s opinion on winter shorts, they happened upon a hidden prophetic warning. It appears that the Frodological prophecy foresees its own fallibility:

“And it shall come to pass that none of it shall come to pass.”

The discovery is alarming in that all of the text’s other predictions have so far panned out. For example, it predicted that when the sins of hobbits angered Frodo, a terrible storm should fall upon the land. And it did last summer, when seasonal rains flooded a few fields and delayed the corn harvest by several days. While no one is sure which sin in particular attracted the wrath of Frodo, whatever it was must have been bad, because the storm came. That kind of thing doesn’t just happen.

Prophecy also proclaims that the River Anduin shall dry up when Frodo’s return is imminent. And the great river did exactly that when a group of local hobbits dammed the Upper Anduin in order to fulfill the prophecy.


That's dam fine prophecy fulfillment, boys!

Yet another example is the widely recognized claim that Frodo will not return until His Hobbit Hole is rebuilt for the third time. It hasn’t, and he hasn’t.

I could give more examples, but I won’t, because prophecy predicts that I won’t. The problem provided by the erroneous passage is of course obvious, but in case it isn’t I’ll explain it for the sake of padding out this article.

Prophecy has so far been infallible, meaning that the prediction of its fallibility is wrong and renders it fallible. But when prophecy is wrong, the prophecy that it will be wrong will be vindicated and it will be proof that the Second Coming of Frodo is imminent. But how will scholars know when the prophecy is wrong, thereby proving that prophecy was right in predicting that it would be wrong? Most predictions are so widely worded that we could attribute anything to them, and the others we just ignore.

If prophecy is to be proved correct by it being wrong, Frodologist scholars will have to be more cautious in proclaiming fulfillment. Theologians are expected to start consulting religious skeptics to judge more accurately whether any given prophecy has been fulfilled, since after so many years of sycophantic agreement with scripture, they have apparently lost the ability to think critically.

Will atheists be the ones to save the Faith? That seems like an attention-seekingly implausible conclusion…

Frodo’s Story, Part II: Miracles 101

In case you missed it, here is Frodo’s Story, Part I

We last left off in Frodo’s story at his return from Mordor and elevation to demigod in the eyes of Middle Earth. Not all was roses, however, as we saw that from the early days of his omnipotence he was competing with his close friend Samwise for the adulation of worshipers, and struggled under the expectations of his followers. We now continue with Frodo’s story.

Almost as soon as Frodo became an object of divinity, he was under constant pressure to keep safe and take no risks. “I liked playing with swords,” remembers Frodo. “But they soon put a stop to that. At first they let me use a wooden one, then a flimsy reed, and finally I just had to make believe. People say leaders have great vision and imagination, but I’ve always thought followers were better at pretending.”

From the beginning, Frodo was pressured into performing miracles. Lepers and the crippled frequently lined up at his door, interspersed with the infertile and the inadvertently pregnant. “It was terrible,” remembers Frodo. “When one of the lepers’ legs fell off, a cripple accused him of taunting the legless and having ‘limbs to spare’. Then the sterile women became jealous of the pregnant, and vice versa. It was a bloodbath.” Indeed it was; one hemophiliacs would sooner forget.

Frodo wasn’t even aware he had performed his second miracle until the news filtered back to him. “’Frodo cures blind man!’ I remember them shouting, and I had no idea what they were talking about. Only later did I remember giving a passing beggar a carrot from my vegetable patch. They said I’d cured his blindness.” Frodo doubted the man had actually been blind, but even if he had been, Frodo still downplays his role in the alleged miracle. “Vitamin A. I’m pretty sure that’s what it is. Carrots are full of it, and it's good for vision. Vitamin A, beta carotene, call it what you like, but other than the actual act of handing him the carrot, I can’t say I cured his blindness.”

Frodo would have one more brush with miracles before it all came apart. “Gandalf wanted to stage a resurrection at one point, but I hadn’t finished reading that chapter in the textbook, so he just killed someone and said I’d come back to life!” But when Frodo tried to leak the scandal to the news, no one would believe it. Conservative pundits called it an “incredible conspiracy theory” and a “dishonest attempt to discredit a genuine miracle.”

Facing a world growing ever more entrenched in their belief in him, Frodo found himself spiraling downwards into a seedy world of drugs, sex, and traditional panpipe ballads. “I was definitely living the cliché,” he remembers. “It was like the point in those movies where you see the protagonist stick a needle in their arm for the first time, and you think ‘ah, so that’s how they got AIDS’. There was no needle, but the descent into ruin was all a little predictable.”

At first his drug use was recreational, mostly Southfarthing weed, and it improved his panpipe playing if anything. “But one day, one of the North Downs hobbits brought round his lute and a wahwah pedal, and told us we needed to take some pills to really ‘get it’. It was like a journey, man, so intense. I definitely ‘got it’. I got other things too though. An addiction, and diseases mostly.”

Frodo would of course climb the long ladder of privilege out of his despondent drug dependency, and other things equally terrible all beginning with ‘d’. But that story will have to wait for next time.



The stuff dreams are made of?

The Beforelife

The soul market is a competitive one, and it’s no secret that the various faiths proffer tantalizing benefits to count you among their members. Mormons supply you with quaint underwear, and Scientologists offer the unique experience to die in circumstances of appalling medical negligence. Many, however, save a few bucks with the winning idea of the afterlife. Christians are promised eternal bliss, while Islamic martyrs also receive 72 virgins, bounty apparently not already encompassed in the definition of “eternal bliss”.

That souls are eternal is a conclusion we can all happily draw without expending time or money to research the question. Frodologist theologians have however identified an enormous period in the soulspan in which its salvation is not being catered for: the period before birth, or as we call it, the beforelife.

Mark Twain wrote that “I do not fear death. I had been dead for billions and billions of years before I was born, and had not suffered the slightest inconvenience from it.” Perhaps he wasn’t inconvenienced, but that’s not aiming very high is it? What if you could prepare for your entire life ahead of time, so that you could forget it all at infancy, and spend the rest of your life remembering it until dementia took over so you could forget it again.

Of course, if you’re reading this, you’ve already missed the opportunity to enjoy the beforelife. But since appeals to their unborn children are generally effective on religious types, think about how much your child could benefit from his or her beforelife. All you have to do is join Frodology, and profess your belief in Frodo. If you’re already a Frodologist, don’t worry, your unborn child is from this very moment, enjoying his beforelife. Just ensure your membership dues are up to date, and you can officially consider yourself a good parent.

Still not sold on the idea? Can’t see what benefit a beforelife offers? Maybe you’re wondering, “what if my child’s actual life is a huge disappointment compared to his beforelife?” Well maybe you should bone up on your parenting. Or you could think of your beforelife like a trailer. At the cinema, don’t trailers make you think “gee, I can’t wait to see that!”? Perhaps you wouldn’t say “gee”. That’s understandable. It’s kind of gay.



And if that doesn’t make you want your children to experience salvation through a beforelife, I give up. Choose Christianity, or some damn thing.

The beforelife: having one is as simple as choosing to have one.

Frodo behind 78% of world’s good

Frodology has conclusively surpassed Christianity in its claim to be the supreme moral arbiter of civilizations past and present. Christianity’s argument is based on its notion that without God, people are basically immoral fiends who bathe in the blood of unbaptized children and don’t reuse their plastic bags. Prominent atheists reject this claim, confoundingly purporting that people can be good of their own volition. Wait, didn’t we just read about people bathing in blood?


Fig. 1, Everything bad you've ever thought about an atheist is true

The problem with Christianity, however, is that it has never been able to quantify what proportion of the world’s benevolence is attributable to their God. While certain apologists will tell us that all of the goodness in the world is the direct result of Yahweh being a beneficent deity, this rings a little hollow. It is for one thing woefully unscientific. For instance, the Christian God makes no mention of dolphins, so preoccupied is He with the morality of man. On the contrary, dolphins are one of the few truly altruistic species on the planet. Why only last week they single handedly disabled and sank Paris Hilton’s private yacht, to the vast amusement of all.

Frodologist scientists, however, have conclusively proven that Frodo is behind at least 78% of the world’s good. Though the remaining 22% remains unaccounted for, Frodo’s lead is unassailable. Already, lesser deities are conceding to His greater moral authority and considering selling their minority stakes. Zeus is reportedly regretful that he expended so much energy on vengeance. “People look for different qualities in their overlords these days, but on the plus side, now I can focus on my music without having to worry about my worthless subjects.”

Christians are wondering where their God went wrong. After all, Yahweh was for so long a savvy deity, reinventing himself as the zeitgeist required. Like David Bowie, he jumped from being a jealous, embittered Jehovah in the Old Testament, to being a loving, forgiving daddy in the New. Somewhere in the subsequent 2,000 years, however, God clearly dropped the ball. The Archbishop of Canterbury admits that the writing was on the wall as far back as Jesus. “We should’ve recognized something was amiss when God could only show his face to the world through a totally different person. He probably couldn’t handle being genuinely nice. It was all smoke and mirrors.”


Fig. 2, Parenting comes easy to no one

Tired clichés aside, Christians are at odds as to when precisely God lost His dominance in the moral market. Some argue it was the First Crusade, in 1099. Others the Second Crusade. Still others believe it was the Third. A minority believe that God still had some moral authority in the early years of the 13th Century, and it was the slightly less early years of the same century that saw his undoing with the Fourth Crusade. Crusades Fifth through Ninth are not considered to have killed enough innocents to be seriously turpitudinous.

Lest this start to look like a guided tour of Christianity’s foibles through the annals, readers should remember that Frodology has a score to settle. So please, humor us while we examine a few more:

• The Spanish Inquisition (1478-1834, approx. 150,000 killed)
  
• Salem witch trials (1692-3, nineteen innocent witches hanged)
  
• Black Death (1340s, approx. 75 million killed because Christians weren’t praying hard enough)
  

Not all of Jesus’ flock are as quick to abandon their religion as the Archbishop however. In an interesting example of double standards, at least six Christians are demanding to see evidence of Frodology’s claim before ditching their faith, evidence being the one thing they did not require in order to start believing in the first place. When this contradiction was pointed out to the hypocritical half dozen, four withdrew their request, leaving a pair of Christians still unconvinced of Frodo’s moral superiority.

Luckily, Frodologist authorities have an ace up their sleeves. “Ordinarily considered a logical fallacy, the ‘appeal to popularity’ technique was frequently employed by majority Christians to get others to adopt their beliefs. It’s sort of like peer pressure. Now that Frodology is morally on top, we see no reason why they shouldn’t accept our fallacious reasoning.”

Frodology wins bidding war for Hell

Share prices in Frodology and its subsidiaries surged today as the morning broke with the news that the Faith was the victor in a tight bidding war to rent out Hell. At a time when the world’s economy is slowing down, and people are turning to religion for lack of a job, Hell has been running low on souls to stoke its fires.

With alternative energy sources beyond Hell’s budget, the government of Hell began to look around for other options. Discovering that its own R&D was at least ten years behind the Soviet Union, and subsequently discovering that the Soviet Union had been non-existent for the past seventeen years, ministers resolved to do something. Having successfully updated their records and history textbooks, they then resolved to do something else, hopefully more useful this time.

It was then that the shadow Minister for Energy suggested outsourcing. With its ovens underutilized, Hell began looking for a religious partner with high forsaking rates amongst its followers. Thus began a fierce bidding war between Frodology and Christianity. Despite the damning of significant subsections of society, such as homosexuals, Democrats, and unbaptized children, the offer of all these souls was not enough for Hell to seal the deal with Christianity.

A minion of Hell later explained to disappointed Christians that “Hell really isn’t a very nice place. Gays, liberals, and unbaptized babies really deserve better.”

Instead it was Frodology that won the contract, breaking a multi-millennial-long affiliation between Hell and Christianity. Asked if the break would not make potential business partners wary of betrayal, Lucifer explained that it is the nature of business, and a necessary part of staying ahead. “We were wary of Christianity’s increasingly stale image, and wanted a fresh, young, energetic partner to help market our brand.” The Devil also noted that frankly, Hell’s services are unique, and the history of mankind suggests that “people will always be coming here.”

Frodologist authorities are reportedly delighted with the deal. With more and more activities being proscribed by the Faith every month, sinners and potential lost souls were really beginning to pile up. “We couldn’t be sure that those Frodo had damned were actually writhing in torment, and not just, you know, rotting in the ground as inanimate corpses.”


Fig. 1, Sinful Frodologists now have more to look forward to after death

The outcome is generally not good news for Christianity, with God now having to find room for His own forsaken. With the End of Days quickly approaching, God admitted that the loss of the contract “couldn’t have come at a worse time.” Sinners are temporarily being sent to Heaven, which is more or less empty, but the influx of the evil means it is quickly becoming an undesirable destination.


Fig. 2, Sinners are ruining it for everyone

Worried Christians are already considering new faiths that won’t make them go there when they die. “Frodologists go to Hell, and Christians go to Heaven, which is quickly becoming Hell. Maybe I don’t need an afterlife after all,” pondered Joey Smith, 16.

The one good bit of news for Catholics is that they no longer have to tithe to the Church, as Hell’s service charge has been assumed by Frodology as part of the deal. Upon hearing this, a bemused Pope Benedict mused “so that’s what it was for!”

Top Fro'Moes declined to comment on the price paid for the contract, but residents of Hell have reported hearing cooing cries of "my precious" of late.


Fig. 3, The Ring may now be in possession of either the Devil, or Mr. Tumnus

“Blessed are the meek” - a closer look

The Gospel of Matthew would have us believe that the meek are blessed because they will “inherit the Earth”. For nearly two thousand years, most mainstream theologians have been happy to go along with this unassuming promise, as it certainly seems harmless enough. Bible researchers have described it as “kind of nice”, and reminiscent of the inside of a Hallmark card.

Recently, however, this chapter of Matthew’s Gospel has come under scrutiny for the questionable logic it bears witness to. It appears that after years of research, the meek have so far accomplished very little. None of the world’s famous monarchs were meek. If they were, they found themselves pushed out of windows, or easily led into damp dungeons with the promise of tasty candy. If the world’s greatest navigators had been meek, the United States would instead celebrate Thank God Columbus Stayed at Home Day. Well actually they wouldn’t, as the continent would still be home to tribes of meek natives, shyly keeping out of each other’s way. There would be no need for peace treaties, peace pipes, or Pocahonti to placate their conquerors.


Fig. 1, Disney didn't believe this version would sell

Games of historical determinism aside, it appears that the meek still refuse to contribute anything of value to the world. A recruiter at one of London’s top management consultant firms assured our reporters that meekness was not a quality that was required of potential employees. “We prefer, you know, people who do stuff”.

Indeed, it appears that “not doing stuff” is the one thing that sets the meek apart from people of worth. Only last month, the world failed to commemorate the passing of meek author Arthur B. Gillingham, who wrote no books of note. Furthermore, the National Meek Badminton League is the only major sporting association in the United States without its own devoted ESPN channel. It is doubtful that a meek person could have genetically engineered dinosaurs from prehistoric DNA recovered from the fossilized remains of mosquitoes.

The likelihood of meekness succeeding on its own is therefore small. Commentators have thus queried whether an outside player will step in at some point and give the meek a helping hand. “They certainly couldn’t do it on their own,” was the overwhelming opinion of all polled wealthy, successful, diligent, attractive, award-winning City lawyers. Still, the inerrancy of Biblical scripture has some worried. After all, it now seems that all that investment bankers will inherit are worthless stock options and suffocating mortgage payments.

“It’s right there in Matthew”, argued the only meek person who didn’t scurry away from our reporters. “It has to be true,” he reasoned, while swatting away a pair of seagulls. “At least I hope it is, because I gave that hobo the keys to my house.” The conclusion urged by these Biblical scholars is to stop trying to accomplish things, because God will give the earth to lazy freeloaders anyway.

We here at Frodology are however deeply alarmed. Frodologists of all stripes are inspired by the journey of Frodo, in which he risked peril upon peril to destroy the One Ring. Sure, he dragged his feet at times. Yes, he had to be bodily dragged out the door by Gandalf. And it’s very possible he sustained that potentially fatal troll wound to avoid having to go to Mordor. But the fact is, Frodo did it. Frodo accomplished something beyond the mere conjuring so beloved of Jesus.


Let us be inspired by this apt passage of Frodo, from The Two Towers, p 258:

“I’m tired, and I don’t think I can scramble among stones much longer tonight…”

Well that’s not the right quote. How about this one, from The Fellowship of the Ring, p 87:

“I do really wish to destroy it! … Or, well, to have it destroyed. I am not made for perilous quests. I wish I had never seen the Ring! Why did it come to me? Why was I chosen?”

Ah, crap. Goddamn Ballantine Books. Ok, well this one is pretty good:

“… The history of evolution is that life escapes all barriers. Life breaks free. Life expands to new territories. Painfully, perhaps even dangerously. But life finds a way.”

Ok, that one’s actually from Jurassic Park. It's still good though.

How to spot a false idol

The End of Days is likely to be a confusing time, with fire raining down from the sky, streets running with blood because the sewers are backed up with people who have defaulted on their mortgages and just need somewhere to stay, and local disruptions to cell networks as people send their grainy, out of focus camera phone snaps into CNN. So you need to be ready to follow your real God, and learn how to ignore the temptations of the many false idols dotted along the way. You might call this a guide to following Frodo and ignoring faux’dos.

Your God doesn’t… wear glasses

While author JK Rowling may have ingratiated herself into the homes of millions with promises of magic and incredible things happening to children far too young to cope with the emotional baggage they involve, her lukewarm literary talents cannot disguise heresy. There is only one Messiah in the canon of unlikely hero characters from literature or film, and that one is Frodo. Plus, Harry Potter’s hair makes him look like a boy version of Hugh Grant, and no one worships him.

Your God doesn’t… wear sunglasses

Since at least the 1940s, people have worshiped wearers of sunglasses. At first, it was the aviator. In the 50s, the rebel rock ‘n’ roller. In the sixties, people realized they could see better on stage without sunglasses. By the seventies, they had the hollow, sunken eyes of constant cocaine abuse to hide. In the 80s, oddly, it was back to aviators, and the nineties briefly flirted with donning a messiah-like hero in a pair of Ray Bans before handing the embarrassing sequels over to the new decade. The transience of these idols alone should suffice to warn the reader off sunglasses as a source of idolatry.


Fig. 1, A matrix of false idols... also, Bono sucks

Your God doesn’t… carry a lightsaber

When George Lucas opened Episode IV with “a long time ago…” he gave the game away. Clearly, the Star Wars saga is set in the future, not the past. And if that is the case, it couldn’t have happened yet, which makes Luke Skywalker and Yoda curious choices for worship. It would be like praying to Jesus to thank him for the second coming. It hasn’t happened yet. And if you have done that, it was a poor tactical choice. In terms of fulfilling his part of the bargain, Jesus now holds all the cards. He may not even come at all. Probably time to call a lawyer.

Your God wasn’t… born of a virgin

And neither was Jesus.

Your God doesn’t… work for CTU

Unfortunately, Jack Bauer is not a deity. Despite his godlike ability to dispatch terrorists while in the midst of a heart attack, and his herculean imperviousness to all Arabs on Fox TV shows being heedful martyrs, he is not a God. That he hasn’t learned to avoid situations that spectacularly absorb precisely 24 hours of his time is appalling. That he continues to trust colleagues who are either alternately least likely or most likely to be moles is staggeringly negligent. He’s not fit to run a Starbucks, let alone be a god.

Your God doesn’t… govern Alaska

On the scale of persons deserving of worship, politicians should generally rank lower than other walks of life. On the scale of politicians deserving of worship, former politicians are better suited to receive praise since their misdeeds are comfortably long enough ago to be forgotten. On the scale of current politicians, heads of state are least likely to deserve worship due to all the backs they trampled on to get there. On the scale of heads of states worthy of worship, those who were actually elected are more deserving than those who weren’t even running for the position. Of those who weren’t running for the position, those who could still feasibly do the job of head of state are, again, better candidates for divinity. Of those less capable of being President, governors of states home to more than one million people are still, again, better choices. Of those whose states house less than a million people, the governors of Montana, Delaware, North and South Dakota, Vermont and Wyoming would all be better choices than Sarah Palin.

Why did I go to such lengths to mock Sarah Palin? I’m just illustrating my ability to write a paragraph, technology still absent in states lesser contiguously abled.


Fig. 2, This government building is not Alaska-accessible

Your God… doesn’t worship himself more than you worship him

Here is a short list of people this excludes:

• Madonna
  
• Mischa Barton
  
• Mel Gibson
  
• Miley Cyrus
  
• Matthew McConaughey
  
• Pretty much every actor or actress whose name begins with ‘M’… no really, its’ true. Let’s keep going:
  
• Mike Myers
  
• Michael Jackson
  
• Most of the Screen Actors Guild
  

Your God… isn’t Keira Knightley’s chin

Impressing followers with enormous idols was a trick of the Bronze Age. You’re not fooling anyone these days, Keira!


Fig. 3, It’s just enormous

Frodologist teen goes missing on Nission

The parents of a seventeen year-old Frodologist boy were distraught today as the dawn of a new week brought no news of their son’s apparent disappearance. Hah, good pun. Slightly tasteless though. Benjamin Baggins was entering the second month of his six month-long Nission when his parents reported to Faith authorities that they had not heard from him in over two weeks.

Frodologists will be able to discern from Benjamin’s chosen hobbit surname that he is a devoted member of the Faith. As such, he enthusiastically embraced the opportunity to embark on his Nission when it was handed down to him on his seventeenth birthday. His whole family was brimming with anticipation as he pulled the details from the envelope back in April. “Our two elder sons were sent to Easter Island and Western Sahara. We were hoping Ben would get sent somewhere as important,” said Ben’s mother.

Trouble in Paradise

As it turns out, Ben was to spread Frodo’s Word among the coca growers of Columbia. “We were so excited,” his mother recalled. “Colombia is on the mainland, and it has a population too. Our other sons were so jealous.” But now it seems like proselytizing in a dangerous drug-peddling backwater isn’t the paradise they all thought.

Benjamin has been out of contact for more than two weeks now. Entering the second month, he was due to begin evangelizing on the use of the semi-colon. Faith authorities aren’t sure what it is about the semi-colon that offended local inhabitants. Benjamin’s mother surmised that it might the ambiguity of the punctuation mark. “It’s sort of goofy looking, stuck between a colon and a period as it is.” But Frodo’s Minions on Earth are keen to raise the profile of the semi-colon in what is increasingly being known as the Era of the Hyphen.

Your Nission, should you accept it...

Some readers may be unaware of the importance of the Nission in the life of a Frodologist. After ‘Mission’ was trademarked by the Church of Latter Day Intellectual Property Thieves Saints, Frodology turned to the next best thing. Since however ‘Islam’ translates to ‘Next Best Thing’ in English, authorities decided to avoid ambiguity and coin ‘Nission’ as the name for the Frodologist coming of age evangelical adventure.

From the early days of the Nission, however, it was apparent that the boys’ experiences would be a far cry from Indiana Jones, as more and more of the teens’ Nissions served as scripts for M. Night Shayamalan films. Several boys have gone Nissing, such that critics in the liberal press are now calling the rite Nission Impossible.

Now Frodologist authorities are having to rethink their plans for correct punctuation. Benjamin’s disappearance suggests that Colombian farmers have rejected Frodo’s message and are not ready to accept the sanctity of the semi-colon. In accordance with suggested best practice, Mr. and Mrs. Baggins have refrained from alerting the police, believing that prayer stands a much better chance of finding Benjamin. Should he not turn up, prayer will also be a useful tool for parceling up their memories so that they can be repressed and painfully remembered two decades later.

Meanwhile Mrs. Baggins remains distraught, but her voice carries an optimistic timbre. “We factored in the risk of our kids going nissing when we decided to get pregnant,” she reasoned. “Why do you think we have so many kids?”

…

“Probably because you never had sex education,” opined the interviewing reporter.

“That was a rhetorical question,” answered Mrs. Baggins.

“I know, I chose to ignore it and give you my opinion. Didn’t you read the word ‘opined’?”

“How could I read it? The article hasn’t even been published yet. And I didn’t realize this was an interview.”

“Oh it’s not. The author’s just practicing writing realistic dialogue. He probably should have stopped several lines ago though.”

“Yeah no kidding, it’s just getting sad at this point.”

“Yet here we are…”

“Do you want to come in for a cup of tea?”

“Sure, that’d be nice. Not like this is going anywhere.”