On tithing, the big difference to me is that tithing is, as I understand it, voluntary. They may suggest 10%, may even suggest it strongly, but if you don’t have it to give, they aren’t going to strong-arm you into giving it. You can still attend church services, receive counsel, and so on. You could be a parishioner your entire life and not give a cent. In most churches you can even receive assistance in various forms–food closets, clothing, sometimes rent assistance and so on.
With Scientology, you have two options. Fork over ridiculous amounts of cash, or go to work for them for years for a pittance, and if you quit before your contract runs out, you owe them tens of thousands of dollars in fees for the auditing you receive during your employ. They claim the payment system is their “tithe” but it’s certainly not voluntary by any means. In fact, in order to receive any services, you must be a “member” of the international scientological organization which I can’t recall the name of. The first six months are free, but it’s $500 annually after that. This is the service that registers you and every bit of “training” you receive. That’s $500 just to be allowed to register to receive any kind of training, which you then pay thousands of dollars for.
Hell, the auditors are required to own two E-Meters, which they pay out of pocket for. These things are built with a few parts from Radio Shack and a couple tin soup cans. CoS charges around $4200 for them and requires you purchase two… in case one breaks down, you know.
Aside from the moneymaking scam part of it, the part that cracks me up the most is that they believe that once you’ve reached the upper ranks of OT, you quite literally have superpowers–control over “Mest”: matter, energy, space, and time. You can move objects with your mind, and so on. Really? Really?!
Lastly, while most churches seem to be geared towards reaching out to the down-trodden, Scientology won’t do anything for you if you seem to have any actual problems, or are in need of any real help. It’s aimed towards making normal people “better”, not helping folks who need help.
You want to get really wigged out about Scientology, do a little sniffing around about their “Ethics” arm, and the “Office of Special Affairs”, formerly known as the “Guardian’s Office”. Those people give me the serious creeps. The rest of it is sick and cult-y and creepy, the OSA/“Ethics” is downright vicious and evil, both to “SP’s” and to members who’ve committed some perceived slight, like being “down-stat” and not bringing in enough “raw meat” marks.
There is nothing about this group that cares one iota about anything but racking in the cash. They’d be hysterical if they weren’t brainwashing so many people and sucking them dry. Their gross annual income is something like $300,000,000. That’s a good chunk of cash for a group that doesn’t provide charitable services.
I guess, to address the OP, I feel comfortable ridiculing Scientology because as others have pointed out, L. Ron Hubbard himself stated that the quickest way to become a millionaire was to start your own religion. They’re not out to save or serve, they’re out to take your money.
