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Scientology's Credibility Questioned Over Video Channel
stonyandcher writes to share that the Church of Scientology has come under fire for some items on their recently launched video channel. Most notably, claims have been leveled that dignitaries in one of their videos were faked and at least one of the people featured in the video is claiming their statements were taken out of context.
Scientology shows questionable credibility? Get right out of town!
For an organisation that thinks we're all possessed by dead aliens using the ramblings of a drug addled hack who freely admitted he was in it for the money as the gospel, you can colour me shocked that they might have a somewhat warped view of the rest of the universe.
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I think the video called "Road to March 15th" had a good bit on that, go look for that.
Most christian churches do not charge their members thousands of dollars on compulsive seminaries. Tithing is voluntary, last time I looked.
No sig for the moment.
I don't give a fuck if you believe in Xenu or Jesus or the Flying Spaghetti Monster, but the Church Scientology lies to and steals from it's 'believers', and does horrible psychological damages to people and their familes. No mainstream religion is remotely as corrupt and sadistic.
Please read for a start:
http://www.exscientologykids.com/
"I only speak the truth"
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A religion generally starts off as one, does not have mandatory financial contributions (no matter how strongly they may *suggest* them) and was not founded by a guy who was previously on record as saying he should found a religion because that's where the money is. They also don't sue people who dare leave the fold.
No true. I'd say that the RCC is the exception, not the rule here. If I remember correctly, there is no eccleasiastical hierarchy in Islam, which already accounts for about 1.5 billion people. There is no formal hierarchy in Judaism either, and many Protestant denominations are also made up of autonomous local congregations that associate on a voluntary basis (e.g. the SBC in the US). Even those denominations that are more organized do not usually have a "central point of authority" as the Pope to Roman Catholics.
The fact is that none of these pagan religion concepts existed before 100AD. There is no written historical account for these concepts before this time (such as mithras was born of a virgin, or osiris was ressurected). All pagan religions reference these concepts in written history after the birth of Christ.
They were talking about the sacrament of communion as far back as 2500 BC: (from Wikipedia)
Since the ancient Nilotics believed that humans were whatever they eat, this sacrament was, by extension, able to make them celestial and immortal. The doctrine of the eucharist ultimately has its roots in prehistoric (symbolic) cannibalism, whose practitioners believed that the virtues and powers of the eaten would thus be absorbed by the eater. This phenomenon has been described throughout the world. One of the oldest of the Pyramid Texts is the Unas[14] from the 6th Dynasty (circa 2500 BC). It shows that the original ideology of Egypt commingled with Osirian concepts. Although ultimately given a high place in heaven by order of Osiris, Unas is at first an enemy of the gods and his ancestors, whom he hunts, lassoes, kills, cooks, and eats so that their powers may become his own. This was written at a time when the eating of parents and gods was a laudable ceremony, and this emphasizes how hard it must have been to stamp out the older order of cannibalism. "He eats men, he feeds on the gods...he cooks them in his fiery cauldrons. He eats their words of power, he swallows their spirits.... He eats the wisdom of every god, his period of life is eternity.... Their soul is in his body, their spirits are within him." A parallel passage is found in the Pyramid Text of Pepi II, who is said to have "seizeth those who are a follower of Set...he breaketh their heads, he cutteth off their haunches, he teareth out their intestines, he diggeth out their hearts, he drinketh copiously of their blood!" (line 531, ff). Although crude, this was a core concept, the conviction that one could receive immortality by eating the flesh and blood of a god who had died
Scientology and the Internet explains the history.
In brief:
- attacks on USENET involving forged rmgroups in 1995.
- attacks on USENET involving Hipcrime-style spam for many years since then.
- legal attacks that resulted in the compromise of every user of the anon.penet.fi anonymous remailer in 1996.
- Angry about copyright term extensions? What we jokingly refer to as the 1998 Mickey Mouse Protection Act was passed into law as the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act. By a staggering coincidence, Sonny Bono was a Scilon.
- Angry about the DMCA? The Mickey Moust Protection Act wasn't enough of a legal club, and guess who was one of the first organizations to use it in mid-1999?
- And guess who was behind the DMCA attacks against Google in 2002.
- And last but not least, guess who was behind the DMCA attack against Slashdot itself in 2001.
Sorry you haven't been paying attention for the past decade, dude, but this is news for nerds, and it is stuff that matters.
If thats the definition for a religion then scientology definitely fits the bill. I speak as a person who was raised by scientologists but has considered them to be one of the most evil institutions i have ever had contact with. It's a shame because some of the ideas behind the "religion" are not bad. If the organization weren't hell-bent on bankrupting every member just so that you might have a chance at reaching spiritual enlightenment then it might be something i would subscribe to.
Includes screenshots & research. http://forums.enturbulation.org/showthread.php?t=5085&page=4
If you think the "church" is evil as well. check out Operation Reconnect.
You can also find out why we protest.
It's better to vote for what you want and not get it than to vote for what you don't want and get it.
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