Here’s a factual description of the Scientology religion for those who aren’t up to speed:
Definition:
The term Scientology is taken from the Latin word “SCIO” : which means, in the fullest sense of the word, “knowing”, and the Greek word “LOGOS” which simply means “study of”. Literal meaning “knowing how to know”.
The subject of Scientology is further defined as :
“the study and handling of the spirit in relationship to itself, universes and other life. “
Scientology is a new religion. Less than 60 years old.It is an applied religious philosophy. By “applied” is meant that it is for use in life and living to improve the conditions of existence.
Scientology is not belief or faith based. In Scientology a truth is only true if it’s true for you, according to your own observation and experience .
It does acknowledge the principle of God or the Infinite but does not try to define or describe this principle, leaving it up to the individual.
It is also not a messianic religion. This means there is no worship of prophets or messiahs or gods.
The most basic principle of Scientology is that YOU are your own immortal soul, that this is not a thing you have but what YOU actually are.
Scientology believes or considers that Man is basically good. This is different from many religions that promote that he his natively evil or bad unless “made” good.
Scientology’s closest spiritual ties with any other religion are with Orthodox (Hinayana ) Buddhism with which it shares an historical lineage. But even here the relationship is based mainly on friendship and the recognition of the being as a spirit rather than any organizational ties.
L.Ron Hubbard explained fully the theology and technologies of Scientology in more than 500,000 pages of writings, including dozens of books and over 4,000 tape recorded public lectures.
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Everything comes from the Story of XENU.
According to the founder of Scientology L. Ron Hubbard, the dictator of the “Galactic Confederacy” who, 75 million years ago, brought billions of his people to Earth in a DC-8-like spacecraft, stacked them around volcanoes and killed them using hydrogen bombs.
Official Scientology scriptures hold that the essences of these many people remained, and that they form around people in modern times, causing them spiritual harm
Xenu was supposed to have gathered up all the overpopulation in his sector of the galaxy, brought them to Earth and then exterminated them using hydrogen bombs.
The souls of these murdered people are then supposed to infest the body of everyone. They are called “body thetans”. On the advanced levels of Scientology a person “audits out” these body THETANS telepathically by getting them to re-experience their being exterminated by hydrogen bombs.
So people on these levels assume all their bad thoughts and faulty memories are due to these body thetans infesting every part of their body and influencing them mentally. Many Scientologists go raving mad at this point if they have not done so already.
Young people, not yet made cynical through the machinations of life and politics, are very keen to contribute to the world and to be ethical. So the “ethics” trick works easily into persuading them to join the “church”. Many of them join an elite group called the “Sea Org” where they become brainwashed slaves. There they work a hundred hour week for almost no pay. There they are subject to every cruel whim of their masters. It is a living hell that they endure because of the conditioning they have received and this now perverted sense of ethics that they have accepted.
The “Sea Org” is the ultimate in brainwashed slavery. They are expected to work harder and harder to achieve ever higher targets of production. If they fail to meet their targets there are various penalties. One of them is to be put onto a diet of beans and rice and to miss sleep. Another is to be sentenced to a period on the RPF (Rehabilitation Project Force). This is the equivalent to “hard labour”. Such is the extent of their brainwashing that they actually write “success stories” when they complete their sentences.
It's not so much brainwashing, but the fact that you don't get OUT of the Rehabilitation Project Force UNLESS you write a sufficiently glowing "I love Big Brother" success-story, wherein you are thankful for the RPF getting your head right.
This is incorrect. Scientology is VERY MUCH a messianic religion. L Ron Hubbard was the prophet, messiah and god of Scientology.
Prophet, because Hubbard discovered that there was a way to achieve perfection. Messiah, because he delivered to his followers the means by which they could achieve salvation, and become as gods. God, because he went beyond being human, and was totally infallible.
It was a basic article of faith in Scientology that, if Hubbard said it, then it was True. If you thought differently from Hubbard (on ANY subject), then you were automatically wrong and in need of correction.
In later years, David Miscavige has sought to impart to himself this same aura of infallibility.
George Costanza: Jerry, just remember, it's not a lie if you believe it.
There was also a really terrific, emmy nominated documentary on the subject by Trey Parker and Matt Stone.
South Park, Season 9, ep 12, "Trapped in the Closet."
Mark
Scientology’s closest spiritual ties with any other religion are with Orthodox (Hinayana ) Buddhism
It's closest spiritual tie is with Aleister Crowley, Golden Dawn, Thelema, Satanism, etc.
Comparing it to any legitimate form of buddhism, or any 'Orthodox' religion is absurd.