Since January I have been looking into the Church of Scientology. My approach was to participate in their activities and experience their beliefs, techniques and attitudes directly. Today 4/4/2000 I was expelled from the organization so I can now speak freely.

If you have had direct experience with this religion then I would very much like to hear from you. Also if you have heard any positive reports then also please contribute. If your only experience is through negative reports and press then you should be aware that much of that bad publicity is old and much seems to be untrue and is quite vindictive or inaccurate. However, if you have confidence in the negative reports then please contribute.

Scientology was created by L.Ron Hubbard initially through his writings he called Dianetics, “through the soul” (from Greek dia, through, and nous, soul). It is a spiritual healing technology (typical Scientology term) that addresses and handles the effects of the spirit on the body and can alleviate such things as unwanted sensations and emotions, accidents, injuries and psychosomatic illnesses (typically those caused or aggravated by mental stress). Definition quoted from Science of Survival (a Scientology publication).

I have not paid much attention to LRH himself (he died in 1986). Claims about his past and accomplishments are controversial, and I can’t decide whether he is a fraud and charlatan or a second Budha. Every Scientologist I met, have nothing other than very high praise for him. In their eyes he is a real hero. In their bookstore and library I saw virtually no other publications other than those written by LRH. If nothing else he was a prolific writer.

Here is a summary list of my experiences. I’ll expand on some of these later if requested.

1. Free personality questionnaire sent through snail mail or online. This would be your first contact.

2. Interview arranged to explain the questionnaire result. This will show that you have a number of personality aberrations and you will clearly need the help of Scientology. You will be sold an initial basic training course that will introduce ‘auditing’. Beware of high pressure sales techniques (the Registrar). I completed the course in two evenings, it usually takes five, but I was considered an advanced student. $45.

3. The reactive mind and ‘engrams’. The theory is that every bad experience we have throughout our lives causes a mental block, lock, inhibition, or other mental abnormality that prevents us from making further progress in life. These abnormalities are referred to as ‘engrams’. If you have ‘engrams’ then you are a ‘preclear’. The objective is to remove all your engrams and become a ‘clear’. When we experience a situation that is similar to a past ‘bad experience’ then our mind ‘reacts’ or remembers and causes us to be inhibited.

4. Auditing is the primary mechanism for curing all your ills. It can be considered as an advanced confessional. The technique is to revisit all your past ‘engram’ experiences and relive them over and over again until they no longer have any affect on you. The preferred method is to verbalize these experiences in front of a trained auditor. The auditor merely guides you through the process and makes the choice of how many repetitions or will gauge success or failure at reducing the ‘engram’. You do the real work and you choose what ‘bad experience’ to expose. Essentially you cure yourself, while the auditor takes a primarily passive role.

5. My basic training taught me about auditing and how to audit, and I actually conducted an audit. Typically, one would be audited by another student, but I must have revealed too much knowledge and was targeted as a primary candidate to be a member of staff. I was offered a free professional auditing session, which I accepted. This was a two hour evening session. I chose not expose any of my real past evil deeds and it was suggested that I select a period of grief, the death of a close relative for example. This was quite emotional but they were well equipped with tissues. I have to admit that the session was effective.

6. Advanced auditing. This involves being connected to a meter while being audited. The meter measures electrical resistance and is quite sensitive to thoughts. I watched a dial register quite distinctly when I thought about something unpleasant and then I saw the needle react less and less as I repeatedly relived the unpleasant thought. The salesman becomes involved here and I am sold the $5500 course for 50 hours of intensive advanced auditing. There are many further advanced courses that appear to increase in cost proportionately. If you really believe that these techniques are for you then be prepared to spend considerable sums of money.

7. After a weekend of thought I considered I had learnt enough so I cancelled the advanced course on the Monday and requested a refund. It seems any monies given to the Church are considered donations or gifts and are not available for a refund. It took me 6 weeks to obtain a refund and which resulted in my expulsion from the Church. This was an interesting experience in itself and required me to submit to special audits (inquisitions) using the meter. In this case the meter appeared to be being used as a lie detector, although such claims are hotly denied. But these audits were certainly not for my benefit. These sessions revealed significant paranoia and fear that I might be part of an investigative organization or media reporter. The 6 weeks of refund ‘processing’ was primarily due to incredible inefficiency, un-professionalism, and sheer amateur bumbling. Note that many of the staff members are volunteers and most others have other full time jobs.

8. During my entire experience I found everyone I met to be very warm, friendly, and genuinely dedicated to their beliefs, several had been involved with the church for over 20 years. Even to the last moment of my expulsion everyone remained genuinely friendly and I was almost disappointed to leave. I saw nothing to indicate that this is a sinister and evil cult, as has been claimed by some of the negative reports available on the web.

Sorry, this post has become longer than I planned. I learnt a great deal more than I have had time to write here, and I will say more if you express any interest or questions.

Cris~

I don't really know much about Scientology, I never gave it a lot of credit, I think there are other, better ways of achieving the same end result. But I also think it probably does work for some people, and to each their own...

I admit I'm somewhat curious now, I didn't realize they were so...intense? I tend to heavily distrust anyone that sells "salvation" - personally I would have walked out the second they asked for dough. I don't mind donating my money or time, but I object to "buying" peace, if you know what I mean. If it's ACTUALLY a donation, there's no set price, y'know?

Anyway, I'm curious what your impression is now of them and the organization. I kind of get the impression that you approve of the core of the system - the "work", but object to the way they have organized it (or dis-organized it as it appears)...did I read that right?

Anyway, thanks for sharing, this is interesting!

A good friend of mine joined it. It essentially destroyed him. He was a very promising body builder whose dedication to his workout caused my overweight and very sedentary brother to start working out. He was honest, dedicated, and very talented. He could make you laugh in spite of any resistance you may put up.

After he joined the Church of Scientology he stopped working out, having come to believe that the physical body was unworthy of such "worship" as to maintain it to any reasonable degree. He learned to start blaming things, his "engrams", on other people. Most of his problems, in fact, he claimed were caused by us, his friends, although when asked what it was that we did he would fold his arms and walk away. We took our concerns to his church and were basically told to mind our own business (but only after we refused to join to get our answers). There was nothing to do but wait.

One weekend he came around, weighing close to 400 pounds, his long, unkempt beard suggesting that he hadn't been near a mirror in months. He wore a skull-and-crossbones bandana wraped tightly around his bespectacled head and he kept his eyes turned downward. He said he was walking around apologizing to all of friends for what he had become. We accepted his apology unconditionally (a few of the others had not been so kind), but he was never the same. He had begun drinking heavily and his normal masculine appreciation for the female body had degraded into perversity.

Although his sense of humor remained intact, I felt that I no longer knew this person. He had changed so radically, had become undependable and dishonest, and his perversions had deteriorated his talents into a grotesque shadow of their former glory. He had given up on improving himself from this state, and he, I, and everybody with whom he is acquainted blame Dianetics and the Church of Scientology.

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I may not agree with what you have to say, but I will fight, kill, and die for your right to say it.

For the record I am not a supporter of Scientology, and I did have a completely open mind when I started this exercise. The people involved and who have found real benefits seem very genuine. However, I see real dangers in what is essentially a psychological practice that is not regulated by any established and accepted safety administration. It is much like using a circus trapeze without a safety net, you are OK most of the time but occasionally there will be fatal tragedies.

When LRH first developed his theories in the 1950s he presented them to the academic and scientific community who rejected them outright. Rather than work on the theories to improve them and fight to gain acceptance, as would any genuine scientist, he chose instead to go it alone and he published anyway. Remember at this point he was already an established science fiction writer and I suspect he had become accustomed to making some profit from his writings. To work hard, on what I see as a potentially very beneficial technique, would have meant many years of painstaking research and experimentation during which time profits would be very unlikely. Instead he has tried hard to discredit the practice of psychology in all its forms and has successfully indoctrinated all scientologists with the same attitude. Even the introductory video film I saw had an episode where the established psychiatry practices were trashed without mercy. This was a recurring theme I noticed throughout my experience. At the time I saw the movie I felt distinctly uncomfortable with such seemingly irrational attacks.

I also noticed many inconsistencies with a number of claims, and I’ll expand on these later.

There is also a strange practice of redefining accepted words. For example I was introduced to the word ‘postulate’. The dictionary definition seems perfectly fine, however, LRH has redefined this word along the lines that this is a seldomly used word and now means the action to ‘post’ a positive suggestion. I couldn’t believe I was hearing this and requested confirmation. I found this incredibly arrogant. I suspect there are many other such cases. In general, scientologists use an almost different language and their own unique terminology.

There was another incident (during a metered inquisition) where I was asked if I were ‘open minded’. And here I was asked to read the scientology definition of ‘open minded’. This involved a key phrase which effectively stated that if you can’t accept ‘auditing’ then you can’t be ‘open minded’. This sounded very much like closed minded to me. Quite incredible!

Those I met made a number of statements claiming the massive benefits they had done for society and quoted many instances of helping convicts in many state prisons, but I saw no material on this and I haven’t been able to find any independent web references. This is why I would like to hear from anyone who has seen positive reports. The scientology internal propaganda machine seems quite powerful and those closely involved in scientology are probably significantly deluded.

As for the money issue; I did enter into this fully expecting to be asked for money. I’m not without resources and was quite prepared to spend for the sake of finding some truths.

Also, my extensive experience with TM (Transcendental Meditation) provided me adequate abilities to control my thoughts during any potential dangerous mental practices, especially the lie detector sessions.

Just thought that I would note that this "auditing" exercise is kind of the same thing I refer to as self-analysis, Jesus being the great psycho-analyst in the sky. The difference though is that scientology has you "relive" the experience over and over until you seem to be "over" it, or rather numbed to it, being that it no longer elicits an emotional response from you. This is nothing more than acclimating yourself, or desensitizing yourself to bad things or sin, which is totally destructive. When Jesus helps you to self-analyze, He doesn't desensitize you to sin, He helps to explain where it was that your or someone else's intentions got screwed up and why. He also points out that you are no "better" than anyone who hurts you. This allows you to have empathy and sympathy, and to realize that most people do not hurt others because they are mean or evil, but because they have been hurt, or are hurting themselves. And the same holds true for yourself, as you may hurt yourself or others because you have the wrong intentions regarding something. This allows for forgiveness, and forgiveness allows for peace of mind. If you can forgive, even if you are forgiving yourself, then you can get over your past and learn a lot from it that can help you in the future. See the difference?

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You may think I'm a nut, but I'm fastened to the strongest bolt in the universe.

Lori,

Apart from the references to Jesus of course, I pretty much agree with you. However, there are cases where we refuse to face our fears and this is not healthy. Coming to terms with a fear and dealing with it is beneficial and I think the 'auditing' technique or self auditing/analysis would work well in these cases.

Thanks


[This message has been edited by Cris (edited April 05, 2000).]

Oxygen,

Sad to hear about your friend. The process he has latched onto is known as recognizing overts. An 'overt' is another scientology term and here means an overt action. The theory here is that if someone seems to criticize you or becomes angry with you out of proportion to the facts, then they probably have done something against you of which you may not be aware.

The example I was given was where an employee was stealing money from the till in a retail store and he was always wary that he might be discovered. His wariness showed when the employer began to notice something was wrong but had in fact no suspicion of the employee. When the employer innocently asked if the employee had seen anything, the employee immediately considered he was being accused and responded angrily. To the employer this was a reaction out of proportion to the innocent question.

The danger here is that we might begin to see overt acts being aimed at us all the time and become paranoid. Recognizing overt acts is useful but must be kept in proportion. Again I see usefullness in the scientology theories but a danger in their innapropriate application and training.

Mooncat,

My fundamental objection to scientology is that they have linked the concept of the 'spirit' to the auditing process. The spirit in scientology is called a thetan. And the objective of scientology is to enlighten and free the thetan in us.

I can't accept the supernatural viewpoint and would not trust a scientologist to audit me knowing that their perspective on life was based on what I see as irrationallity.

I see potential benefits in the auditing process if it could be made independent of the spiritual aspects and could be subjected to independent verification and safety controls.

Cris,

Why did you say "apart from the references to Jesus"? Have you ever done this type of exercise with Jesus? Are you saying that you are unfamiliar, or that you disagree?

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You may think I'm a nut, but I'm fastened to the strongest bolt in the universe.

As I am not and have never been a Scientologist, I will limit myself to three comments.

* The official name, I might remind, is Church of Scientology, Inc.

* Although I do not actively take part in this fight, the internet presence of CoSi critics far outweighs the presence of its supporters; this, I'm given to believe, is a matter of Verbal Tech. (Comments recently made by John Travolta in the press merely mentioning that his wife would be giving birth according to Church standards, I'm told, are a violation of V-T). I looked up Scientology once online, and got a list of critical sites that rivals the critics of the Latter-Day Saints. (There's a CoSi-critic site that displays aerial photos of the Scientology compound along the San Jacinto River; I mean, is this just a little paranoid?)

* I, personally, have never seen CoSi literature that was being given away. Glancing quickly to the "Incorporated" designation, I'm wondering if the only way to advance within the church really is to fork over huge amounts of cash.

Let me say, though, that I commend you, Cris, for taking what I consider a big risk. I have always hesitated to outright rail against CoSi because I cannot seem to learn much without joining, which is an alarm bell in my head. I can only apologize that I have nothing specifically relevant to your post to offer; thank you, though, for your insights.

Peace,
Tiassa :cool:

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The whole business with the fossilized dinosaur eggs was a joke the paleontologists haven't seen yet. (Good Omens, Gaiman & Pratchett)

Lori,

I owe you a more appropriate answer and it will be easier if I quickly explain my background.

I am a product of the British school system. Every school day from the age of 4 through 16 I actively participated in morning prayers and hymn singing, as well as listening to a sermon. Additionally one of my compulsory subjects was religious education. And all of this was Christian. This was a legal requirement in England during my school years. From the age of 17 I was free to choose and I embraced the Baptist movement which was particular strong, upbeat and very modern in my area. I remember wholeheartedly accepting Jesus as my savior and asking for forgiveness. There was much emotion and many tears during this period in what I would guess was an apparent genuine love for Jesus. I was certainly an active advocate for Christianity. From around the age of 20 I started to have doubts and delved deeper into the teachings I had received over the previous 16 years, but now as a more informed adult. By the time I was 22 I had pretty much rejected Christianity. I’d like to say the decision was instantaneous, but I remember having doubts for many years after that. And that was 26 years ago. I have continued to research Christianity and have looked at other belief systems as well, and as you see I am still researching.

As I have grown wiser and more experienced I have come to realize that reliance solely on emotions and instincts usually end in failure. Increasing knowledge of how the world operates has led me to view everything with a far more analytical and empirical attitude. Research into a number of areas including the book of Q and the dead sea scrolls has led me to what I see as very clear – Christianity is essentially nonsense, and the gospels are wonderful works of fiction and mythology, and I’ll justify these statements in later topics.

My research of scientology was extremely brief compared to my lifelong examination of Christianity.

To answer your question more directly, I believe that what you said, with minor changes makes perfect sense without the reference to Jesus. These things you say are real human values that do not require a need to believe in the supernatural.

I have read many of your posts and I believe I understand your perspective to a large degree. I also recognize your total commitment to what you believe, and no one is likely to change that, and I wouldn’t try.

tiassa,

I very much welcome any comments from you, no matter how brief. I recognize you as my intellectual superior and I have enjoyed many of your posts over the last few months.

I know there are many critical sites but some of the material is dated, at least a lot of what I saw, and relates back to times when LRH was alive. They are currently having a bad time fighting the state run churches in Germany, and the British dealt them many harsh blows in the past.

From my direct experience I think they really want to change the world into something better; the removal of chaos, wars, and confrontation, etc. Their goals are truly noble, but they have a very murky past, which may take them many decades to overcome, if ever. The staff members are paid a pittance, if anything, and I suspect the whole organization is not financially sound, although I have not actively looked for financial data.

They are also leaderless, which may give them a problem. Much of the material I saw was the same that LRH wrote back in the 50s and 60s. Even the introductory movie looked very dated with 60’s style clothing. LRH did everything so I don’t think they will be able to evolve without a replacement leader. Even the phone system seemed 20 years old, and voicemail just didn’t exist – trying to locate someone by phone was chaos.

As for the cost of training: No I don’t think that is a real problem. I saw one of the critic sites make that claim but talking with the senior auditors revealed that it was common practice for two candidates to team together and they would audit each other as part of their training and thus save significant costs. I don’t see how they could survive otherwise.

As for risk taking, oh yes that is for sure. The worst moment was when I returned for my refund, assuming that it would take a minute or two. Instead I was presented with a notice that said I had a made a voluntary donation and that a refund was not usually possible. Uh oh! I’ve just thrown away $5500. The notice then went on to say that if I contacted any third party for advice especially anyone in the legal profession then no refund would be possible. I knew at that moment that I had a fight and I was on my own. As it turned out I learnt a lot more about them and spoke to more senior staff in trying to escape than at any other time. The experience was invaluable and actually good fun, although their incompetence with such simple things as making appointments was a real test of my patience. My final argument to them, which turned the tide, was to convince them that I firmly believed that a belief in supernatural spirits was irrational and detrimental to the human race. To help with my arguments I borrowed directly from Boris’s arguments on the matter. Boris, if you read this, many thanks, those posts you made were very timely and worked well in the face to face debate. This approach convinced them that I did not qualify for their services and that I should not have been offered the auditing package in the first place. It then took them 10 days for the entire hierarchy to agree and authorize the refund.

Here are some web references if you want to see the Scientology shop windows.

The main web page.
http://www.scientology.org/scn_home.htm

The online book stores.
http://www.lronhubbard.org/p_jpg/book/html/bookschm.htm
http://www.bridgepub.com/

Your local church/ORG locator.
http://www.scientology.org/p_jpg/world/worldeng/global/globaloc.htm

If you want to see their full range of books then you can visit any one of their ‘offices’ and buy whatever you want. You don’t need to join the religion to buy their books.


[This message has been edited by Cris (edited April 05, 2000).]

My mother was part of the Church of Scientology before I was born...she said that it was a good experience all in all. She didn't donate any money, but instead devoted her time to the church for a few years. When she completed that time, she was paid in books. She has a huge 'library' of books by LRH...I must say that the philosophy seems to make some sense. However, there are some distinct differences in actual practice and philosophy. My mother, though she has no hard feelings, decided to stop being involved in the church.
I personally have undergone a similar program of peer counseling, where a person just listens while the other vents. Unlike the corporation of scientology, it's free, and not very hard to find people to do it with...although I don't recommend doing it with a close friend or family member.

I think that dianetic therapy can be very helpful, but it's one of many ways to solve a problem, and if you really want to do it, you should find other people, read the auditor course, and 'audit' each other without draining your life savings. I don't think that any true religion would take so much from people if it was really a good thing. I would rather think of dianetics as a helpful philosophy among many other equally helpful ideas, and not use it as a religion.

--GS

[This message has been edited by Kashani (edited April 19, 2000).]

Kashani,

That's makes a lot of sense based on what I saw. There were definitely some good aspects to my experience and the "self auditing / friend auditing" could be quite useful. There were other aspects that I found quite contradictory.

Thanks.