"Scientology and Me"

Scientology and Me.

I've found Panorama a bit woolly for me of late, but the Scientology "expose", for want of a better term, was entertaining. I would have lost my temper a long time before Mr Sweeney.

In the late 1940s, pulp writer L. Ron Hubbard declared: "Writing for a penny a word is ridiculous. If a man really wants to make a million dollars, the best way would be to start his own religion" He then went on to found Scientology.

The science-fiction background of Scientology is revealed to those who choose to join after they have reached the state they call "Clear", meaning freed from the aberrations of the mind. Scientology is also a "Pay as you Go" cult, so expect to have donated thousands of pounds by this point.

On the levels above the state of "Clear" they encounter the story of Xenu. Xenu was supposed to have gathered up all the overpopulation in this 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! There was a funny South Park Episode explaining this, which is available to stream here.

Now, that sounds weird, but possibly no weirder than any other cultish or religious beliefs. Personally I'd rather spend a night with a copy of Richard Dawkin's "The God Delusion" Than a copy of Dianetics by L.R Hubbard.

The Church of Scientology rejects the idea that mental illness has a biological basis, holding that such conditions are exclusively mental and spiritual problems which Scientology can correct. Scientology regards psychiatry as incapable of providing improvements in mental health and of being overly zealous in prescribing drugs. So, how do I explain the hundreds of people I have seen helped greatly by antidepressants? Over the years I have seen hundreds of people lifted out of depression with the help of medication. Am I deluded, or too close to see this "truth"?

They also believe that psychiatrists were the cause of the rise of Nazi Germany!

All I have to do now is come up with a theme for my very own religion. Any ideas?