http://www.matrixfiles.com/Scientology%20Materials/index.php?dir=ABILITY+0-192+Journal%2F&download=Ability+3+Minor+(1955).pdf

http://www.lermanet.com/shannon/47.htm

Hey John, I just received 3 replies from you regarding some comments I made a few months ago. Initially it said they were made about 4 hours ago, however when I clicked on them it indicates they were written at the same time I posted them (which was about 3-4 months ago). Since my knowledge of anything related to computers/Internet is very limited I’m not sure when they were made. Regardless, I appreciate your compliments & feedback as I often read your postings.

LOL! The first time I read Battlefield Earth I was 16(ish) and I loved it. I tried to reread it, along with some other SciFi I loved when I was younger. Ender’s Game still rocks (cannot wait for the movie,) but I couldn’t make it through the first chapter of Battlefield Earth.

Thanks for the reply. 🙂

In my experience with Catholics, it’s not simply a line of more corruption the higher up the ladder you go. Frankly, I’ve found that lay people are much more likely to be self-serving/hypocritical, with at least the first level of ordained religious (priests, brothers, nuns) being much more curious, open-minded, ecumenical, and interested in ethics/morality. But it seems pretty clear that things start getting more political (and therefore easier to forget the people) at the next level. I don’t know how this compares to other organizations/religions. I imagine it’s not uncommon, but probably somewhat different for Scientology where one isn’t ever really “culturally” a Scientologist (so there’s probably not the same intellectual laziness from the “lay” people). Scientology also lacks the safeties of other organizations in how DM was able to seize power.

And Scientology seems to be very self/individual-focused. I’ve spent time in counseling/therapy, and I found this aspect of it to be initially helpful, but eventually rather counter-productive. At the end of the day, humans are social animals. We need each other, we feel for each other, we want to help each other, and it takes something to break us of empathy. Our direct connection to people might sometimes cause us pain, but it also is protective against all sorts of health problems, both mental and physical. Not sure where I’m going with this, but in my mind it’s somehow tied to the elitism of the Scientology view (because people are so individually responsible and asked to turn each other in).

I am not terribly familiar with the volunteers Scientology sent (sends?) to disaster areas. In my understanding, one advantage religious groups have (along with any organization of people) in those situations is that they already have these networks in place and can mobilize to take advantage of them very quickly. Granted Scientology has so few people it doesn’t seem that they’d be able to take advantage of that, but I don’t really see a way that they’re harnessing the power of however many people they do have to be more than just the sum.

The cognitive dissonance built into Scientology is a problem, and we don’t give enough weight to the ways in which language can be used to trap us against our will. I don’t think that this kind of resistance to internal criticism/external research is really that common for other ideologies (I could be an idealist). I do see it in Mormonism (setting your religion up to be both literal and falsifiable is really problematic!) and some very conservative Christian groups and is clearly a cult warning sign. But I also wonder what leaves people more vulnerable to this. It’s pretty evident that intelligence doesn’t provide much protection in and of itself. I come from a very strong “devil’s advocate” culture (which is not without its problems) and that might help. And it seems like many who end up in Scientology find some pain eased, at least initially. I hope that even after the CO$ has falled, we continue to discuss it for prevention and support in the future.

PetriDish, sorry for the delay replying: I was busy being suppressive elsewhere.

I don’t think I disagree with any of that (though I confess the Paterno-Sandusky reference, I had to look up). I am not condemning the Catholic Church out of hand: just its leadership.. Similarly, I do not for one minute doubt the good faith of many practising Scientologists: just that of its leadership. The higher up you go in the hierarchy however, the harder it is to keep your hands clean, as many former senior members have had the decency to acknowledge (but not all).

I take your point too about Scientology’s non-existent track record in real — as opposed to imaginary — good works. Here again though, I’m sure some of the volunteer teams sent to Ground Zero or New Orleans, sincerely thought they were doing vital work that mere mortals could not manage.

You are right about the fundamentally flawed way they view the world, the deserving/undeserving, the essential elitism at the heart of their superman/wog world vision. I grant you that this sits uneasily with what I said about the good faith of many members. But I suspect many of them haven’t really worked through the full implications of their world view — there is a kind of moral cognitive dissonance that has set in. It is reinforced, of course, by the thought-stopping mechanisms that Hubbard built into the system: the demonisation of SPs, the belief that exposing yourself to material critical of Scientology — entheta — is bad for your spiritual progress. But you could also say that this kind of double-think is typical of true believers across many ideologies.

The point you made in your final paragraph, which I think is generally one about shades of grey — that a hero in one domain can still have feet of clay in another — is also well taken.

Looks like it’d need serious popcorn!

http://i65.photobucket.com/albums/h233/RogerRamdrive/trs01-1_zps1a999194.png

That date is a useful tool when reading an article: When it mentions a founding date, it tells you if the writer has been paying attention or just blind copying without checking. 1954, then they’re definitely not paying attention.

Actually, ??????? (ekklesi) is “calling forth” and ???????? (ekklesia) is gathering or assembly, coming from the word that was used in ancient Greece for political assemblies or gatherings.

Check ?????? ??? ???? ????????? ???????, ???? (Dictionary of Modern Greek) by Georgios Babiniotis. You could also try Liddell and Scott’s, “Greek-English Lexicon”.

The Volunteer Minister’s Outback Goodwill Tour. I’d been reading Dianetics, got in touch with someone from the Church and was put in contact with someone on the GWT. There were no orgs or anything around that area but there actually were Scientologists operating—either passing through or operating there independent of the Church, on account of the distance to the nearest org.
I did visit the Sydney org and AO as I was leaving Australia, that was actually quite cool.