I hate myself! Now YOU can too!

[Samuel John Klein]

Well, that is to say, I've got to quit reading books about Scientology, even though two new excellent books of criticism and assay have been added to the corpus. I'm morbidly addicted to reading about the life and ruin of L. Ron Hubbard. I don't know why.

[Rick Keeney]

I will tell you why, Samuel John Klein. Because it is handy among a kindred group to have those who are repositories of specific knowledge. If I need input on Scientology (a subject I am interested in but unlikely to read about) I will ask you.

To that point: Does Scientology seem to shield celebrity homosexuals who have decided for whatever reason to remain closeted? ('Scuse me if that language sounds half-assed; I don't feel like editing myself right now.)

[FrankChurch]

Best way to follow any church--if the poor are not welcomed then it is false.

[Samuel John Klein]

I will tell you why, Samuel John Klein. Because it is handy among a kindred group to have those who are repositories of specific knowledge. If I need input on Scientology (a subject I am interested in but unlikely to read about) I will ask you.

To that point: Does Scientology seem to shield celebrity homosexuals who have decided for whatever reason to remain closeted? ('Scuse me if that language sounds half-assed; I don't feel like editing myself right now.)

I've the feeling that Scientology has sheltered a lot of celebrities from a lot of things. The gayness of people that have been held up as Scientology spokespeople is a strange subject to me; those have always been rumors, and until such time as they say, one way or the other, I care not. However, as an image control problem (at least I assume so from the POV of said celebs) and that Scientology seems to find that homosexuality is aberrant, then they'd not so much as shield them as try to 'fix' them. Scientology celebrities have the reputation of being pampered and removed from what the church staff go through, so it's not too much of a stretch to assume that if a celebrity is closeted, the church would try to keep it that way.

If you can follow my logic here.

[Samuel John Klein]

Best way to follow any church--if the poor are not welcomed then it is false.

You've nailed it there, Frank, true.

[Samuel John Klein]

I feel it incumbent to mention that I am not nor have I ever been a Scientologist. I just have an outsiders' morbid fascination for that subject,as well.

[Lori Koonce]

Mr Kline

May I recomend a website?

Clambake.org (lower case c) is a place where formed Scientologists share some really scarry stuffs.

For those who don't know Scientology states that man evolved from clams, hence the name.

[Mark Tiedemann]

I've always felt Mormonism and Scientology bear much in common (aside from the trek through the desert bit and the lynching of the founder). Both are wholly concocted, made-up religions which, in my view, clearly demonstrate that Truth has nothing to do with religion. I still find it difficult not to laugh when I hear a self-professed devout Anything theological respond to a description of either one with a "That's silly!" Oh, and yours' ain't?

[Samuel John Klein]

Mr Kline

May I recomend a website?

Clambake.org (lower case c) is a place where formed Scientologists share some really scarry stuffs.

For those who don't know Scientology states that man evolved from clams, hence the name.

Good call. Been there, though. Yes, it's an excellent site, though, and functions as the biggest and most comprehensive archive of Scientology's fight with the Internet. Founded by Andreas Heldal-Lund, who was never a Scieno, back in '96.

Yep. It's been up for 17 years. It been that long? Cripes!

For those who are just joining us, I'm not yankin' Lori's chain, I'm just jaded. I remember reading alt.religion.scientology, back when Usenet was the world-wide-web (of a sorts). If you haven't seen it, and want a riproaring good time, then do as Lori says.

I been around longer than I care to think about (and have posted to the appropriate area of this forum peforce).

For those who want to check it out, clambake.org works, also xenu.org. First url redirects to the second one.

[Chuck Messer]

Mark wrote:

I still find it difficult not to laugh when I hear a self-professed devout Anything theological respond to a description of either one with a "That's silly!" Oh, and yours' ain't?

Or, as Bill Maher has said,

Oh, but the talking snake, that's perfectly reasonable.

Chuck

[Samuel John Klein]

Mark wrote:

I still find it difficult not to laugh when I hear a self-professed devout Anything theological respond to a description of either one with a "That's silly!" Oh, and yours' ain't?

Or, as Bill Maher has said,

Oh, but the talking snake, that's perfectly reasonable.

Chuck

That kind of encapsulates the entirety of my 'spiritual seeking', and why I've pretty much given it up. It started with the littler fish, like Scientology and its similar ilk (with its combination of Buddhism, SF, WTFism, Scn can't really be identical to anything else, only similar, sortakinda), and once it sunk in that Scn was kind of a bunch of assumed and applied bullshit, that infected my perception of the other religions, one by one, spreading like a virus amongst them, because the basis of all of them … I don't care what anybody says … is that you have to accept everything important in them on faith, from the body thetans and Xenu of the Scientologists to the resurrection of the Christians (even the 'enlightenment' of the Buddha).

It was a point of liberation for me.

I will be honest here. While I have given up spirituality in the main, I do recognize that I have apparently been wired for this, and must have some sort of talisman to keep me from having a down and dirty, endless psychological argument with myself about it. I wear a little pendant, a taijitu, what we Occidentals inaccurately call a yin-yang, because in the meta I think it symbolizes everything that needs to be symbolized about the frail human psyche and its position in the universe. That's my cards on the table right there.