scientology

A Concise Appraisal by Ecclesia Apostolica Jesu Christi

&

Scientology is the creation of Lafayette Ron Hubbard (1911-1986) who was born in Tilden, Nebraska, USA. He attended George Washington University and, according to his publications, graduated with a major in civil engineering. However, campus records indicate that Hubbard had attended college for only two years and that during his second year he failed physics and was placed on academic probation. He did meet with success as a science fiction writer in the 1930s prior to the publication in 1950 of Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health. This became the textbook for a religion that he invented in 1955, popularly known as Scientology.

Jack Parsons, a rocket scientist, started a branch of Aleister Crowley’s satanic religion called Thelema based in Pasadena, California. He later changed his name to Belarian Armiluss Al Dajjaj Antichrist, and pledged himself to fulfil the work of the Beast 666. An earlier attempt, in March 1946, was to try to call down the biblical Whore of Babylon into the womb of a living woman by a combination of strenuous copulation and incantation for three days. The female was a member of Ordo Templi Orientis. Keeping detailed records of Parsons unsuccessful black magic ritual was friend and scribe Lafayette Ron Hubbard. Four years later Hubbard lay the foundations for his own religion, Scientology, by publishing Dianetics. Scientology later spawned the DeGrimstons, a British couple who were to establish the overtly satanic Process Church of the Final Judgement that took root in the counterculture of the early 1960s. It was founded by Robert Moore and Mary Anne MacLean, who were later to rename themselves the DeGrimstons. According to Process literature, they worshipped a trinity of Jehovah, Lucifer and Satan. The rôle of Satan as executioner was further expressed in the following utterance by the church: “My prophecy upon this wasted earth and upon corrupt creation that squats upon its ruined surface is: THOU SHALT KILL!” The Process venerated Adolf Hitler and their chosen symbol was four Ps conjoined in a derivative of the swastika. The Process Church, predating the Church of Satan and the Temple of Set, emerged from the cult of Scientology.

Combining Freudian psychoanalysis with Eastern thought and ideas from his science fiction writings, Hubbard produced a religious cult that has gained a wide appeal with those seeking improved mental health. Fundamental to Scientology is the concept that the mind is divided into two basic parts: the “analytical” and “reactive.” The key to achieving mental health is to subject oneself to the examination and treatment of an “auditor.” Auditors use a device called an E-meter, which supposedly measures the body’s response and resistance to “engrams.” The religious foundation on which it is built stems from the notion that human beings were once “Thetans.” These “thetans” are believed by Scientologists to have relinquished their godlike powers to enter “mest” (matter, energy, space, time), or earth where a process of evolution took place and human beings emerged who could no longer remember their pre-existent state as “thetans.”

The basic doctrines of Scientology, along with some comparisons to Christianity, are outlined as follows:

God ~ The universe contains many gods, and there are gods beyond even these gods. Christianity is strictly monotheistic.

Jesus Christ ~ “Neither Lord Buddha nor Jesus Christ were OTs [Operating Thetans, the highest Scientology level] according to evidence. They were just a shade above clear.” Jesus Christ is relegated, as with other Eastern groups, to the status of an avatar that denies His exclusive place as “very God of very God, begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father, by whom all things were made.” (Nicene Creed)

Cross ~ Scientology denigrates the cross as an ancient symbol introduced by “preclears a million years ago.” Yet the holy cross is a pivotal symbol for the Church that cannot be dismissed in the biblical tradition.

Humanity ~ Scientology sees the human being as a fallen thetan. Human beings have the potential to be coached (audited) to an awareness of their pre-mest deity. Scientology does not distinguish between the Creator and the creation. Christianity strongly maintains the distinction between God and creation. Human beings are made in God’s image, not in the image of a thetan. The human race is in a state of fallen, active rebellion against God. The essential message of the Christian Church is that God has made it possible through the person and work of Jesus Christ to motivate people to bring an end to sin and rebellion, by His promise of eternal life through Jesus Christ.

Sin ~ There is no such thing as sin or evil.

Hell ~ Hell is a myth and an invention; it is a cruel hoax perpetrated by the miserable in order that others might be miserable as well. For Christianity, hell or a state of everlasting torment is no myth. Jesus spoke candidly on the subject.

Salvation ~ Freedom from rebirth; here it can readily be seen how Scientology embraces Hindu-like concepts concerning reincarnation. All faiths are paths that lead to salvation. For the Christian, salvation is only obtainable through Jesus Christ.

Heaven ~ There is no heaven in the sense that the Bible defines it. But heaven does exist in that it is the embodiment of a deified state to which humanity may return. Here Hubbard proposes the Eastern conceptualisation of soteriology. Without a doctrine of original sin or eternal damnation, and coupled with a pantheistic view of life and God, Scientology leaves one to seek out a salvation that is latent within the human soul and grounded in the past and in past lives in the cycle of reincarnation. Christianity, on the other hand, grounds salvation not in latent ability residing in a human being but rather in the person and work of Jesus Christ. The Scientologist searches for the answers to life in the deep recesses of the psychology of one’s past and past lives. Christianity, too, is dependent on the past that historically occurred in the Crucifixion and Resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth, not a past grounded in psychological ruminations.

In the latter half of the 1970s Hubbard disappeared both from public view and from his family ~ and lived in seclusion in California. Ronald DeWolf, one of Hubbard’s five children, changed his name to renounce his father, claiming that he was “one of the biggest con men of the century.” Death came to Ron Hubbard ~ by then a veritable hermit ~ in 1986.