Have you ever met a scientologist?

There is a Scientology "center" about 20 minutes from where I live. Of course I don't live in Hollywood or any of the places where they have celebrity centers. Those are the places where it's marketed more fiercely. Those are the places where people have the most money to spend.

Many normal people get involved with this organization. Certainly NOT the "10 million" that Scientology claims as memberships numbers (the accurate figures predict that around 500,000 are active members), but many nonetheless.

Probably the biggest reason that people join the organization is because it is "sold" to them. It pays current members 10% commissions, called FSM (Field Staff Member) commissions, for bringing in new recruits who take a course or get counseling, so Scientology members routinely try to "sell" Scientology to others.

The new members then, in turn, are required to pay vast amounts of money to the organization in order to receive "auditing", courses and literature, take tests, retake tests, etc. Here is a run-down of all the costs involved with Scientology membership: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientology_as_a_busi...

Well I don't know what you read that gave you the "butt kissing"

explanation regarding Scientology and Hollywood celebrities, but I have met many Scientologists mostly not Hollywood celebrities.

There are thousands of them all over the world! It's the media that has the fixation with Hollywood and thinks it's the only place of any interest.

I currently live in Toronto , Canada. There are at least a dozen or more Scientology churches and missions in this country. Most have several hundred parishoners. But Scientology has

Churches amd Missions in over 163 countries around the world. This number is increasing all the time.

Out here in the real world it's a whole lot more than a "Hollywood" fad. But then Hollywood and the real world have never had that much in common...........

The real world has been around a lot longer too and Scientology

is very much a part of it.

Hollywood may or may not be around in the future but Scientology definitely will be.

And ,Yes, I am a Scientologist (tho' not a "hollywood celebrity")

As far as I know I've never met a scientologist. I never even heard of them until a few months ago when the media got hooked on Tom Cruise and other celebrities.

I'm from Europe.

When I was a college kid in the mid 1970's I was approached by someone from scientology and was persuaded to enroll in something they called a "Communication Course". I was promised that I'd learn skills that would improve my relationships, business skills, etc. In the "comm course" people were divided up in pairs and we were told to sit in chairs opposite our partner and look at them without talking or moving for long periods of time. It was very odd and I couldn't see how staring at each other would teach us to communicate better. The scientology staff people were not allowed to answer any questions in their own words, they would only read verbatim from L Ron Hubbard's book. It was bizarre.

People were repeatedly summoned into private rooms where high pressure sales people would try to sell something scientology calls auditing, which was very expensive. They wanted thousands of dollars to sign me up for auditing but they would not answer questions about what auditing actually is -- they would only read passages from Hubbard's book.

After a while it became obvious that the comm course was a joke. The sales people were getting very aggressive even though they refused to give me information about what they were trying to sell. So I got tired of the BS and quit.

Last time that I was having breakfast with Tom Cruise we had lots of fun... ;)

YEs, I live in Las Vegas. The thing is, they dont agree with psychology, and yet their whole religion is based on psychology.

Nope.

i know a few. even i was one for a while until i reliazed i didnt even know what it was it was teaching. hahaha ya its really a fad.

im from orange county california

here in australia, i needed some help after meetin them, the scary!

Yeah in Tampa bay they grow up in trees. There are like 10'000 around here.

THIS IS SCIENTOLOGY

1. What is true for you is what you yourself observe to be true.

2. Man is his spirit not his mind or his body.

3. The spirit creates his own mind. Please, do not confuse the mind with the brain that is a physical thing. The mind is composed of mental image pictures as explained in Dianetics. These pictures serve the spirit to give him knowledge and experience. These pictures are composed of energy. The energy in the picture can affect the spirit. You can feel better by remembering something that you like or angry by remembering something else. These emotions are actually energy waves emanated by the picture. You can actually feel pain by remembering a pain memory. Sometimes these pictures are accompanied by ideas or considerations. Lets suppose that you father beat you mom up in front of you. Your father was the dominating figure so you might conclude that you have to act like your father in some situations. This is what we call on Scientology an aberration (a conclusion that is imposed to you by a mental picture). This picture is what we call a engram (a pain memory that affects your judgment and free will).

4. You can discharge the energy in these pictures through communication. This is Dianetics Auditing and is the oldest of hundreds of Scientology techniques used to improve the individual.

5. The Spirit creates his own emotions. Are you happy? Are you sad? Are you depress? Maybe you think that something external of you is creating your emotions. Maybe you believe that you are sad because you had a bad day or maybe you believe that you are happy because you had a great day. And this might be true. But who made the decision that you had a good or bad day? You did. You decided if life was good or bad, and adjusted your emotions to respond to your own consideration. You created your own emotion.

Some people are born with everything they want and are still unhappy. And others are born into humble means and are happy. What's the difference? The only real difference is each person's ideas and considerations.

Scientology uses hundreds of processes in order to help a person get a better understanding and a better outlook in life by using his own observations.

6. Scientology Ethics. Ethical people take full responsibility for their actions. Un-ethical people blame others for their actions. "Wrong doings" diminish and deteriorate the freedom of the spirit because the need to justify the "wrong doing". So the spirit is enslaved into repeating the "wrong doing" in order to justify the original "wrong doing". The road to freedom lies within taking full responsibility for your personal condition and actions, past, present and future. Scientology provides the tools to help the person able to be fully responsible over his life thus rehabilitating his ability to be good and self determined.

Also Scientologist base their conduct on a non-denominational code of conduct. http://twth.org/eb/?id=16664j

7. Scientology and God. Scientology acknowledges the supreme being and promotes the individual search for closeness to God trough religion.

8. Scientology vs Psychiatry. Psychiatry believes that self awareness, feelings, love and faith is merely cellular activity. Basically they think that you are your brain and you are not in charge of your behavior but your cells are.This is a totally materialistic point of view that denies the spirit and God. Psychiatrist is a pseudo science because it is based in principles that are false. Psychiatry have never proven that any "mental illnesses" (like they call it) has any connection with a physical illness. Any Neurologist will tell you there are no medical test to identify a "mental illness". All Psychiatrists base their diagnosis on opinion and opinion alone.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=3895596783...

http://video.yahoo.com/video/play?p=cchr&toggle=1&...

Happiness, exhilaration, depression and psychosis are states of mind, not diseases. All what you have to do to stop being depress is change your state of mind. How you do that? By changing your ideas and considerations. Scientology provides the tools to achieve a better state of mind in accordance with your own point of view.

Also Psychiatrist excuse the most horrendous crimes as mental illnesses. This is actually creates a sense of irresponsibility in society because it tells people that they are not responsible for their actions. Second they promote that drugs are the answer for your problems. This message promotes the use of drugs to find release from life and creates the current drug addiction problem in society. Drugs will only give you temporary false release but will never solve the source of your problems.And actually drugs will keep you away from finding a true spiritual release.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-443705188...

Note: Scientology doesn't have anything against Psychology or Neurology. Also the mere awareness that you are a spiritual being and not a body makes you better person.

9. Scientology is a force for good in society. Scientologist fights Psychiatric abuses, http://www.cchr.org/ dangerous and harmful drugs, criminality, http://www.criminon.org/ and drug addiction. http://www.narconon.org/ Also Scientology fought and won against the FDA and the IRS. And Scientologist initiated the social reform group "Youth for Human Rights" http://www.youthforhumanrights.org/ and the movement "Say no to drugs and yes to life". http://www.notodrugs-yestolife.org/

Scientologist are some of the more intelligent, able and successful people in this planet. Including Jenna Elfman, Kelly Preston, John Travolta, Priscilla Presley, Sofia Milos and Leah Remini. Even Danny Masterson from the that's That '70s Show is a Scientologist.

10. Scientology is the only church that doesn't ask for donations from their parishioners during their Sunday Services. All chapel services are 100% free (marriages, naming ceremonies, ect). Scientology earns it's money by delivering courses and auditing. Courses and auditing are optional. You do not need to take courses and auditing to be in Scientology. All you need to do to be a Scientologist is to read the books and apply Scientology to your life (like I do). But if you want auditing there are many alternative and economical ways to achieve this.

a. You can do volunteer work in your local church and get your services for free.

b. You can study to be an auditor and perform all your auditing with a fellow student. This way you can also provide free services to your friends and family. This is actually the preferred way to become clear because you learn how to help others. Scientology isn't about you going clear but taking responsibility across all your dynamics (self, family, group, humanity, life, ect).

11. Scientology and aliens. The story of Xenu is just a fable like the story of "Jonah in the Whale" in the bible. Fables are not intended to be taken seriously. The story of Xenu doesn't have any significance on Scientology beliefs.

12. Anti-Scientology propaganda is just that, propaganda. If you wanna know about this propaganda see my blog: http://www.myspace.com/129727315

References

http://www.neuereligion.de/ENG/index.html

http://www.bonafidescientology.org/

http://www.chaplaincare.navy.mil/Scientology.htm

http://www.religioustolerance.org/scientol.htm

http://www.scientology.org/

http://www.beliefnet.com/sem/scientology-religion....