Much of the therapeutic processes that originated from Dianetics have made its way into Scientology as religious practices. One of these practices that most “preclear” Scientologists go through is the therapeutic process of auditing (Anderson). Hubbard claimed that the reactive mind contained painful and traumatic memories that are the source of many of physical and psychological weaknesses known as “engrams” (Reitman 52). Scientologists claim that, through the auditing process, they can successfully get rid of these engrams for the person to reach the state of Clear. A primary auditing session involves a preclear reliving “engramatic” incidents from the present to the past until they find the “prenatal incident”. (Reitman 52) The auditor would
…show more content…
The thetan is meant to represent a person’s true spiritual being, separate from the “the mind, body, and the physical world.” Scientologists claim that a person’s thetan has lived through many past lives and contains stored memories from those past lives. (Reitman 70) These memories could become problematic to the present, which is why Scientologists feel the need to recover those memories for the person to achieve true spiritual enlightenment (Scientology 101).
The Church teaches that to reach spiritual enlightenment, one must have high ethical standards. The Church defines ethics as “rationality toward the greatest good for the greatest number of dynamics” (Reitman, 2013). These dynamics were one’s relationships with themselves, their families, social groups, society, plants, animals, the larger physical world, a supreme being, and, most importantly, the church. Having these ethics would discourage members from pursuing goals against the church, or as Hubbard would put it “counter-intentions” (Reitman, …show more content…
The IRS determined Their classification as a religious group and not by philosophers or theologians. This says more about religion than it does about Scientology. How could there ever be a standard for determining what constitutes a religion? If claims can be made without any evidence, any imagined absurdity can be considered a religion. In 1967, the Australian government issued a report on them saying, “There are some features of Scientology which are so ludicrous that there may be a tendency to regard Scientology as silly and its practitioners as harmless cranks.” But its conclusion was that “Scientology is evil, its techniques evil, its practice a serious threat to the community, medically, morally and socially; and its adherents are sadly deluded and often mentally ill.” In 2009, a court in France convicted them of defrauding recruits out of their savings. At the same time, France also classified Scientology as a dangerous cult. In Canada, the government refuses to recognize Scientology as a legitimate religion, which perhaps is one of the reasons why it is so much less prevalent than in the United States. Governments have even gone as far as banning open members of the church from their country. For example, Germany has denied entry to Tom Cruise because he has “publicly professed to being a member of the Scientology cult” as the German defense ministry said (Entertainment, 2007).
The thetan is meant to represent a person’s true spiritual being, separate from the “the mind, body, and the physical world.” Scientologists claim that a person’s thetan has lived through many past lives and contains stored memories from those past lives. (Reitman 70) These memories could become problematic to the present, which is why Scientologists feel the need to recover those memories for the person to achieve true spiritual enlightenment (Scientology 101).
The Church teaches that to reach spiritual enlightenment, one must have high ethical standards. The Church defines ethics as “rationality toward the greatest good for the greatest number of dynamics” (Reitman, 2013). These dynamics were one’s relationships with themselves, their families, social groups, society, plants, animals, the larger physical world, a supreme being, and, most importantly, the church. Having these ethics would discourage members from pursuing goals against the church, or as Hubbard would put it “counter-intentions” (Reitman, …show more content…
The IRS determined Their classification as a religious group and not by philosophers or theologians. This says more about religion than it does about Scientology. How could there ever be a standard for determining what constitutes a religion? If claims can be made without any evidence, any imagined absurdity can be considered a religion. In 1967, the Australian government issued a report on them saying, “There are some features of Scientology which are so ludicrous that there may be a tendency to regard Scientology as silly and its practitioners as harmless cranks.” But its conclusion was that “Scientology is evil, its techniques evil, its practice a serious threat to the community, medically, morally and socially; and its adherents are sadly deluded and often mentally ill.” In 2009, a court in France convicted them of defrauding recruits out of their savings. At the same time, France also classified Scientology as a dangerous cult. In Canada, the government refuses to recognize Scientology as a legitimate religion, which perhaps is one of the reasons why it is so much less prevalent than in the United States. Governments have even gone as far as banning open members of the church from their country. For example, Germany has denied entry to Tom Cruise because he has “publicly professed to being a member of the Scientology cult” as the German defense ministry said (Entertainment, 2007).