You are correct; it was in his interview with Matt Lauer.
As opposed to Scientology, which is a scam.
BMalion, I’m sure it was unintentional, but I’d appreciate if you would ask a moderator to fix your post to give proper attribution to that quote, seeing as how it was said by Tom Cruise and not by me. Thanks.
So is most psychiatry.
On what grounds?
:dubious:
Might I suggest that a new thread on the merits/demerits of psychiatry be started elsewhere?
A pill for every emotion.
My two contacts. A long time ago the brother of a girlfriend of mine got suckered into them, and started giving them all his savings. Luckily, he was underage, and his parents got it back.
The brother of a friend is quite high in the ranks. He was ordered not to let his father be in contact with his children. (Directly ordered or pressured I don’t know - same thing.)
Warning: in many of these threads, a Guest will show up, claim that he is not associated with Scientology in any way, but be very familiar with its secret tenets. He’ll defend it, often being very polite. None in this thread, so far. They must be slipping.
Oh, and a couple of Hubbard’s stories from Unknown in the early '40s weren’t too bad. He was indeed a hack writer, but he used to have some talent.
Hubbard was a professional hack. He was quite good at it until he got full of himself latter.
Strange, radical new religions tend to get demonized whenever they emerge, and as far as I know Scientology is the strangest, most radical new religion out there. That doesn’t mean you should jump in blindfolded, but if you’re willing to sell yourself out to a goofy religion (and they’re all goofy), why not one that people you admire belong to?
Mosier, if I had to pick any of a number of goofy religions, I wouldn’t pick the one that tells me I need to cut myself off from my family and all my former friends. Or the one that charges me thousands of dollars just to learn what their creed is.
Isn’t there a biblical precedent for not fraternizing with non-Christians?
Also, I’m unaware of any Scientology directive to “cut yourself off” from anyone. Are you sure that really happens? I suspect it’s more like a little nudge toward the idea of sticking where you belong (just like every other religion) rather than a forced exile.
Mosier - what is this biblical precedent you speak of for not fraternizing with non-Christians? Never heard of it.
You say that you’re unaware of any Scientology directive to “cut yourself off” from anyone. How familiar are you with Scientology directives? This is what I’ve heard from first-person accounts (granted, people that have left the church).
In any case, charging thousands of dollars just to learn their creed seems sufficient reason not to get involved with them, even if you disagree with the first two points.
Nope. There’s the “unequally yoked” phrase from 2 Corinthians 6:14
This is generally taken to refer a warning that a Christian should not choose to marry a non-Christian. In many other places the Bible encourages Christians to be good employees of non-believing bosses (Colossians 3:23), if they are already married when they come to faith they should strive to be good spouses of non-believing people (1 Corinthians 7:12-14), and Jesus himself dined with non-believers several times (Mark 2:15-17).
Sorry, my mistake. :smack:
You were quite right. Thank you.
Especially when you can learn it just by watching South Park.
I have read Dianetics, and a couple of years ago I shared rent with a guy who was casually (yes, casual Scientologists exist) involved with Scientology. We’re still good friends now.
His father went wayyy over the deep end with it though, living like he had given some kind of Scientologist nun vows and was obligated to live in the church and devote his life to it. He had no job, no self esteem, and was generally a pretty miserable person, though, so I’m pretty skeptical of the self actualization the original poster is attributing to the religion.
You know, the only one I’ve never heard some really crazy stuff about is the Bahai. I don’t know of anyone who really hates them.
I’ve heard that the Baha’i get rough treatment from Muslim fundamentalists in places like Afghanistan and Iran. The reason is that the orthodox view is the Mohammed is the “Seal on the Prophets”, and that there are no prophets after him. Yet this, of course, is precisely what Bah’ullah claimed to be, in the very recent past. (Muslims also take a dim view of the Mormons’ Joseph Smith, for the same reason).
Sure, the Muslims don’t accept anything that came after. One of my favorite stories is about how a Saudi Imam issued a Fatwa against anyone who said the Earth was round, until a Saudi prince went up in the Shuttle Discovery, came back and told him that he saw definitively that the Earth was in fact round.
IMHO, this is part of the Muslim problem with modernity, so many scientifically demonstrable proofs that Mohammed had nothing to say about. Though, I think the concept of being a ‘seal’ on the prophets isn’t only a part of Islam. Gotta create the brand loyalty and all.
Doesn’t Baha’ullah say something about being the last prophet?