Thomas Keneally on the website of the movement. He is also a keen supporter of rugby league football, in particular the Manly-Warringah Sea Eagles club of the NRL. In 2004, he gave the sixth annual Tom Brock Lecture. He made an appearance in the 2007 rugby league drama film "The Final Winter". In March 2009, the Prime Minister of Australia, Kevin Rudd, gave an autographed copy of Keneally's biography "Lincoln" to President Barack Obama as a state gift. Keneally's nephew Ben is married to former Premier of New South Wales and Sky News Australia newscaster Kristina Keneally. Keneally wrote the Booker Prize-winning
Ark of the Covenant radio-carbon dated to about 1350, which coincided with the sudden end of the Great Zimbabwe civilization. French author Louis Charpentier claimed that the Ark was taken to the Chartres Cathedral by the Knights Templar. One author has theorised that the Ark was taken from Jerusalem to the village of Rennes-le-Château in Southern France. Karen Ralls has cited Freemason Patrick Byrne, who believes the Ark was moved from Rennes-le-Château at the outbreak of World War I to the United States. The Ark of the Covenant was said to have been kept in the Basilica of St. John Lateran, surviving the pillages