Disputaciones
Your question has been thoroughly answered, and your premise, that LotR and HP include the same amount and quality of witchcraft, proven as false. Maybe you could carry out your intellectual exercise of finding something else wrong with Tolkien or his works on your own, then report your findings back here? I'm embarrassed for you at the way you're going on.
Consider also that "Lord of the Rings" is simply the most popular and well-known saga of events within the Middle Earth universe. Tolkien created a fictional universe where there exist a plethora of different creatures, lore, languages, histories, etc. The events which occur in the Lord of the Rings, while significantly impacting that universe, probably don't even amount to five percent of the history of Middle Earth. Tolkien was a scholar in his own right with a particular penchant for languages and mythology; this shows in his own work and in his desire to leave behind tales of folklore for English speaking peoples. So don't get too excited at the chronology of publications; the scope of Tolkien's work and imagination is considerably-- even indescribably-- vast. The man created multiple functioning languages* for goodness' sake. You don't just publish it all in one fell swoop over the course of a few summers.
*Not even to stand on their own, but simply as supporting elements in fictional folk-lore universe where he also created the cartography, history, relationships, etc. Take a second just to stop and appreciate the immense and intellectual feat here. Another element which separates Tolkien from Rowling :)
Peccator Marison
What you have to say is strikingly familiar to a sort of essay I read on a forum once, where two parties were arguing back and forth (in great, admirable detail) about whether or not the ethos of Tolkien's work was essentially gnostic or Christian/Catholic. Naturally, the observations you've made are very similar to the fellow in that thread who argued that paganism informed most of Tolkien's work. I wish I still had a link to that.
While confident in your assertions, I don't find any of them to be particularly moving. As Pax Vobis said in this thread, Tolkien wasn't re-creating the gospels and just re-setting them in a fantastical universe. He was creating new folk-lore. As a Catholic, his Catholic sense informed his work (probably most notably-- or at least accessibly-- Gandalf, who is a Christological figure in an abundance of different ways) but his work was not a literal transplant of the Gospels to Middle Earth.
Anyways, I'm assuming you referenced Gimli's love for Galadriel. There was nothing sultry about it. In fact, I always understood Galadriel--more than any other woman-- to represent the Blessed Virgin. Understanding also that dwarves at least colloquially represent Jєωs, I always read their interaction as the softening of a hardened heart, by the interior and exterior beauty of a revered maiden. Gimli was changed after he met the Lady Galadriel, and not because she satisfied his lust.
If my memory serves, Niggle was more of a fictional essay-- not part of Lord of the Rings or Middle Earth. More of an insight into the creative process, yeah? The creative process does usually involve self-introspection and hard labour, for better or worse. In either event, isn't there a certain melancholy to purgatory? The proverbial light at the end of the tunnel? I don't find there anything essentially objectionable that Tolkien focused on this, since Niggle is fiction and mythology-- not spiritual reading.
As to the allusions to paganism, more specificity is required. Tolkien was influenced by mythology, and Northern European mythology in particular. Beowulf, Thor, etc. It seems that you find this objectionable as such, but I'd have to disagree:
Approaching Fiction
Mythology has long been part of a classical education. The lessons taught and learned through different mythological sagas are of the transcendent type: heroism, love, loss, betrayal, etc. Expressed usually in an entertaining and engaging way, not intimidating the reader but of enough interest to make an impression.
Peccator, it seems to me that your thoughts on Tolkien (and mythology too) are informed by an unspoken premise that fiction, as such, is inherently undesirable if not actually evil. And I don't think you're alone in this thinking-- if I wrongly presume, feel free to ignore everything else I have to say.
The argument I'd expect, would go something like this: with a finite amount of time on earth and an urgent end goal (salvation) combined with the obvious knowledge that spiritual reading and content which is explicitly Catholic is superior to that content which is not, why ever spend time consuming any other type of content? And from this rhetorical question, one might even conclude that it's inherently vain, superfluous, or even wrong to consume anything other than explicitly Catholic material.
But the Church, at least not to my knowledge, has never condemned any particular brand or medium of fiction (obvious caveats like pornography, snuff films, etc. excluded). Certainly not for the laity. And in fact, priests and Catholic lecturers tend to have a pretty sturdy foundation in classic fiction. Greek plays, northern mythology, Shakespeare, etc. I think if nothing else, this shows that the Church through immemorial practice, has shown herself to at least tacitly approve of the natural lessons taught through and by classic tales of morality.
Now, all that being said-- just as the clerical and virginal state is superior to the married, explicitly Catholic material is objectively better than fiction. And I believe this. But similar to this relationship, though obviously not on a sacramental level, the Church understands the natural merit of fiction, especially for those who are not called to the religious life. She understands that wholesome-- or at least not harmful-- distractions are helpful to the laity (in moderation, of course). It's really at this more abstract level, understanding that leisure as such (sports, visual media, music, books) isn't objectionable, that the principle is proved, and from there it's logically reasoned that fiction as such, is not objectionable.
The only question then becomes whether or not a certain work of fiction is objectionable. When it comes to Tolkien, I don't find your objections to bear scrutiny. As mentioned previously, immorality exists in all works of fiction. Judging a work (in part) depends on the purpose of the immorality. In Tolkien's universe, immoral characters are foils and antagonists, not protagonists. And the mythology angle, that there's something wrong with LotR or Tolkien's work as such because of its mythological influence(s)? I don't find this convincing because the source material is without condemnation. Consider also that when considering mythology, one considers stories occurring within a particular "universe." Even if there is a particular irredeemable myth, other myths in the same universe are still judged on their own merits. The scope of LotR would require it to be judged this way.
At the risk of becoming (more) tangential, I'll more or less wrap things up here. I apologize if this was a needless extrapolation, but I really sensed in your post an inherent contempt and suspicion toward fiction, which led me to believe that simply replying to your specific allegations against Tolkien would not be enough. A final thought: spiritual and explicitly Catholic material is objectively superior to that which is not, so please don't see me as arguing that it is. And one's station in life obviously factors in to things; a cleric or one called to the single life (which I think of as modern hermitage, more or less) will obviously have a more austere and strictly discerning approach to these things. Maybe you fall into one of these categories-- just keep in mind that the vast majority of us do not. My salient point in all of this, despite the verbosity, is quite simply: fiction, judged unobjectionable in its own right, is appreciable-- and Tolkien, according to this rule, also is (naturally as a matter of taste, one may simply not like it-- but that is entirely different from arguing against it from a moral view).