Never Mind the Mollusks

Spiritual Philly should welcome the Scientologists.

By Steven Wells
Add Comment Add Comment | Comments: 0 | Posted Aug. 1, 2007

Illustration by Hawk Krall

Oh God. Sinister cultists the Scientologists are buying a new headquarters in Philadelphia on which (it being "a place of worship") they'll pay no taxes. The bastards. Soon they'll be out in the street--nicely dressed, glassy-eyed and grinning--conning innocent Philadelphians into taking a "free" personality test in an attempt to lure them into a hell world of unimaginably banal fourth-rate sci-fi gobbledeygook.

Here are just some of the crazy mental-in-the-head, batshit insane things Scientologists believe: All humans contain an ancient space alien soul thingy called a thetan that was created 75 million years ago when Xenu, leader of the Galactic federation, carried out a space alien massacre by dropping atom bombs into volcanoes. Humans contain another soul thingy called the Genetic Entity (GE) which is, in fact, a type of shellfish. To be specific, a clam.

I could go on. But I won't. Life is way too short to waste time reading about patently absurd and obviously made-up-out-of-thin-air bullshit concocted by the craven and used by the evil to con money out of the gullible. Which is why I'm not writing about Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Hinduism or any other utterly ridiculous supernatural belief systems either.

Friends, I come not to attack Scientology, but to defend it. Like the 'ologists themselves, I'm sick and tired of the unremitting media hostility toward a bunch of conniving assholes and deranged idiots whose beliefs, while moronic in the extreme, are no more absurd or offensive than those preached every weekend in thousands of temples, mosques, churches and synagogues all over Philadelphia.

No doubt Time magazine and the BBC and all the other frightfully earnest Scientology bashers think they're being incredibly righteous and brave when they report the human misery this crazy cult leaves in its wake. But can't that be said of all religions? Including the ones based on an allegedly God-written text that apparently reveals that the all-powerful, all-knowing creator of everything is against abortion even though (for some unfathomable reason) he forgot to actually mention it in the Bible. Like at all. Doh.

So let's cut Tom Cruise and co. some slack. Let's welcome the Scientologists to Philadelphia. Let's smile understandingly when they double-park outside their brainwashing center in the exact same way Christians double-park outside their brainwashing centers all over Philadelphia every single Sunday.

And so--on behalf of all spiritual Philadelphians--I'd like to say: Aloha, crazy, swivel-eyed, ridiculous-stuff-made-up-by-a-not-very-good-;science-fiction-author-with-a-silly-name believers. Welcome to the City of Brotherly Love. Good luck with the human hunting. Now how about paying some taxes?

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