Scientology

I always thought of it as a Hollywood must-have bonkers belief system, but they do prey on the vulnerable -- don't all cults? The goal is not, I don't think, collective suicide. As Tom Cruise is on board, that's a shame. Only joking, Tom. Is there an environmental message in there? Carbon footprint thing? Cause John Travolta uses a Boeing 747 to nip down to the supermarket. http://naptime500.blogspot.com

I would like start a religion based on the quote, "Don't take life too seriously, it's NOT permanent!" Man is made up of three elements. 1. The body...which must, at all costs, be pleasured with food, alcohol and sex 2. the mind...the all important control centre, which must be optimised for pursuit of the above pleasures 3. the spirit. That which we may come to believe we have when shit-faced. When the power of love overcomes the love of power, we'll find peace. - Jimi Hendrix

I have close experience of Scientologists. The very first band I played in in London back in '87 comprised 4 Scientologists and myself. I went down with tonsillitis for the hundreth time. I got sicker and sicker over a couple of weeks. I was told by the manager also a Scientologist, to stop malingering and 'think' my way out of it. That was it. I went back down to mum in Oxford where my throat closed completely. Liquids just came back through my nose. I ended up in hospital where I was told if I'd left it any longer it would have gone down to my lungs and that would have been bye bye styx.The band sacked me. Nice people eh?

I'll come to the defence of Scientology here (parts of it, at least) and state that some of it is actually pretty good stuff. A lot of the original 'thinking' behind it was taken from the more austere forms of Zen Buddhism with its aims of erasing the ego, controlling the passions of the mind and body, and becoming utterly 'present' and self-aware. Unfortunately, it has been misappropriated by a number of less-enlightened folk who have turned it into a rather scary, cultish sort of belief system, where you have to pay, literally, to 'evolve' through the system. A friend of mine dabbled in it for some years and got a lot of very valuable thinking out of it; but when it came time for her to pay for the next level, she was pressured by other 'higher' thinkers, and so bowed out. But she still used the techniques she learned to help her in everyday life; a lot of good communicative techniques and self-esteem building. Like any other self-help system, you have to think very critically about what you are being 'taught', and choose the stuff that works for you. Scientology gets a lot of (understandably) bad press, but some of the fundamentals are things that any sensible person would stand to benefit by using. I wouldn't, however, be so thrilled about Tom Cruise being the spokesperson. That man has the insight of a village pond, as do many of the more 'famous' Scientologists. I would recommend investigation before scepticism, even so.

I recommend Russell Miller's biography of L. Ron. Hubbard, Bare-Faced Messiah.

I'd like to know more about "proper" Scientology than I do (the things AG is talking about), but I think the problem here is that Scientology and a kind of heightened version of Celebrity Culture have merged. Certain very public, very famous people have attached themselves to this "religion" and become (by default or otherwise) its spokespersons. I think, probably with any religion or belief system, we should listen to the quiet, humble, unassuming, non-gregarious people - the people who we don't think of as Tom-Cruise-the-actor, John-Travolta-the-person-who-flies-jumbo-jets-to-the-supermarket, etc. We already have very strong opinions of these people, even before we know what they "believe" - as does the vast, all consuming monster that is Global Media. So many factors come into it; there are so many powerful (in numerous ways) people and organisations telling us who believes what, how they express those beliefs, what the organisations attached to those believes get up to... and these are the same people and organisations who care so much about J-Lo's cellulite, what A. Jolie eats for breakfast and the horror at J. Aniston leaving the house in a tracksuit... If Tom Cruise was a Buddhist, I suspect he would be a very different type of Buddhist to an ascetic Lama living in a hut in Tibet... pe ps oid ... What is "The Art of Tea"? ... (www.pepsoid.wordpress.com)

"I think, probably with any religion or belief system, we should listen to the quiet, humble, unassuming, non-gregarious people..." Christ on a bike - it's not a religion. It's a worldwide scam with so much money behind it that they take anyone who tries to expose it through endless court battles designed specifically to drain them of resources. You won't get to find out about it properly until you pay them, because they do everything they can to make sure their doctrine isn't actually reproduced for cynics to scrutinise. That sound like a religion to you? Rather than 'spreading the word', their way of recruiting people is to carry out 'stress' tests on them, tell them that their life is empty and meaningless, and then promise them a solution *if* they pay the extortionate membership fee. It's then run like a course - you buy a new book for each stage, and advance up a kind of 'ladder' until you supposedly achieve complete spiritual understanding. That sound like Buddhism to you? Jeez, I thought everyone *knew* this by now!

I watched the programme and if they had have tried harder, to find someone more facistic to represent Scientology, they couldn't have. One very scary guy.