The Pros And Cons Of Scientology

Sixty years ago, a man named Lafayette Ronald Hubbard formed a religion that, to this day, has caused a rather large amount of controversy. With 500,000 members in 8,000 churches scattered throughout 164 countries, the church has been growing slowly but surely since formation. (Scientology.) The religion is based on a novel by Hubbard called Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health. They believe that about 75 million years ago, an evil alien Warlord named Xenu banished 13.5 trillion aliens to Earth and those aliens’ souls have been latching on to humans ever since. (Rowley) Although this may seem rather ridiculous, there is a decent number of people who are members of the church and wholeheartedly believe every word they are told.

According to Hubbard, an energy in its own “spiritual universe,” named Theta, created the physical universe. He claims that souls, referred to as thetans, are all parts of the spiritual universe. These thetans inhabit human bodies and when their human body dies, they simply move on to a different one. Hubbard states that an engram is a bad thought or feeling and engrams from previous lives are the causes for physical and mental illnesses in current lives. The only way to eliminate these engrams, according to this ridiculous theory, is to go through a series of “tests” called auditing. The more times a Scientologist goes through auditing, the higher level he/she can reach. When he/she reaches the level of “Operating Thetan,” he/she is believed to be able to send his/her thetan out of his/her physical body to control matter, energy, space, time, thought, and life. (The Beliefs and Teachings of Scientology) The ultimate goal of Scientology is referred to as “The Bridge to Total Freedom.” ...

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...twork, that would field phone call complaints in relation to cults for one reason or another and Scientology acquired more complaints than any other organization. Suspicious as it is, Scientology then bought out the network and is now running it. Coincidentally, there are no longer any Scientology related complaints. (Behar) As Michael Shermer said, “In my opinion, if Scientology is not a cult then nothing is a cult and the word has no meaning.” (Is Scientology a Cult?)

After seeing countless pieces of evidence stack up against this so called “church,” it still has many unfortunate followers. The deceptive nature of Scientology is problematic to society and it must be stopped as soon as possible. It is simply a dangerous, greedy, illogical cult that wants only to get more money and they don’t care who they have to hurt to get it. Scientology must be stopped.