SCIENTOLOGY
Caring Church or Cancerous Cult?

The Sunday Tribune, 8 June 1997, page 13 (Full A3)

Cat and mouse battle for a heart and mind

Odhran Fortune's contact with Scientology heralded his withdrawal from family and friends, writes Gary O'Shea.

Odhran Fortune's family remember him as a bubbly character with a devil-may-care attitude to life. He was seldom without a girl on his arm and displayed a ferocious passion for water sports. Outgoing, witty, adventurous, that was Odhran before he fell in with the Church of Scientology at age 19 while on a hotel catering course in Birmingham in 1992. Following a move to Copenhagen later that year, Odhran's behaviour began to unnerve his family. He began to send books and videos on dianetics to friends and relatives who were largely unimpressed by scientologists' bizarre set of beliefs.

Odhran himself had begun to lose his humourous spark. His attention span began to dwindle and conversation had to be forced out of him. A Christmas visit to his family home in Gorey, Co. Wexford during 1995 left those around Odhran particularly dispirited. Now 22, Odhran was no longer game for a swift half in the local, had adopted melancholy garb and could not be drawn out on life in Copenhagen. A further visit slated for Easter 1996 failed to materialise and by his next visit at Christmas that year Odhran was unrecognisable to those who had known him best. Odhran was not just distant. He could barely string a sentence together. He had undergone a spectacular loss of weight and was now sporting dull hollow eyes. In the spirit of scientology, he took endless snaps of family members.

In the same fashion family and press who made the jaunt to the cult's West Sussex base on Friday had their every move shadowed by scowling camera-wielding church members. In the early part of his most recent stay in Wexford, Odhran maintained a stringent regime of exercise and meditation but gradually weaned himself off his scientology lifestyle. Although never quite returning to normal, he rediscovered his love for water soprts and would spend weekends with his brother Damien, 22, skiing on the West coast. But the grip of the scientologists proved hard to wrestle off. Throughout January the family home was bombarded with phone calls from Odhran's former handlers, anxious that he return to Copenhagen immediately. Cult members called to the family home and in one case maintained a vigil outside. But by the close of January the hardball tactics seemed to have ended and the scientologist's battle to secure Odhran wilted.

Odhran was regaining weight, "eating like a horse", as cousin Barry put it. He said: "There were certainly ups and downs but in general the last six months have been very happy. Odhran seemed to be talking more about the future". Odhran no longer answered questions with curt yes or nos and began to socialise and go to parties, though remaining a teetotaller. He took a part-time job in White's Pub of Courtown and began studying for his VHF radio licence. But hopes sank for the Fortunes last Sunday night. Just after 10.30pm he told Mary White, the landlady of White's Pub, that he was taking a short break. In a phone call to the popular pub some 40 minutes later he explained that "something had come up" and he would not be back.

Sensing a swoop by the scientologists, family members and friends moved to cover sea ports and airports in the region. They were un-successful in preventing Odhran's departure. He left from Dun Laoghaire early the next morning in the company of a leading member of scientology's Dublin wing. On Friday morning some 14 friends and relatives descended on scientology's headquarters in East Grinstead, West Sussex in an attempt to make contact with their estranged relative. The heavily guarded compound lies on a picturesque winding stretch of raod about an hour's drive from London. The Fortune entourage was met at the compound gates by Graeme Wilson, the church's public relations officer:

A team of bulky security guards videotaped the group's every move. The Fortunes' frustration was almost palpable as church officials attmpted to stonewall them as to how they could contact Odhran. Brother Diarmuid, 30, who has spent three days without sleep, became agitated. Sister Denys, an designer, put a defiant face on things and said, "This is my family they're messing with". Mother Ann, a hairdresser, was reduced to tears. Odhran's anxiety-ridden father Joe Fortune, a furniture store owner, watched the proceedings in disbelief. When requested to [obscured word-"contacted"?] Odhran, Graeme Wilson asked the family, "Why should we?" Access to the compound was refused and church members were ushered past the waiting press and ordered not to comment. Graeme Wilson maintained to family members that Odhran had rejoined the church of his own accord - as laid out in a statement to Surrey police earlier this week. The Fortunes claim Odhran has been mentally coerced into making the statement. Their feelings on Odhran's safety were most adequately summed up by a family member who commented: "Nil aon tintean mar do thinteain fein".

Family fail to persuade son to return home

After a three-hour stand-off the Fortune family were 'escorted' to London where they met Odhran in a toilet.

A visibly shaken Wexford family returned home to Gorey yesterday evening having failed to convince their young sibling to turn his back on a religious cult last week. Fourteen family members and friends of the Fortunes travelled to the Church of Scientology's headquarters in East Grinstead, West Sussex to demand a meeting with Odhran 24, who disappeared from work in Gorey last Sunday night.

The former restaurant catering student had returned to the cult having kept his distance from them since December. Following a three-hour stand-off in East Grinstead, the immediate family were ordered to follow a cult car to London. The Fortunes say they were also "shadowed" by another car from behind before meeting their estranged relative in a London toilet. Distraught brother Damien told The Sunday Tribune: "They have total control over him. They can press buttons to switch him on and off. They have him wound up. he is much more edgy. Back home he's a different guy." Damien met his brother for the first time since his dramatic disappearance last week from a pub where he worked in Gorey. Odhran had left all his possessions behind him in Gorey, including spectacles, clothes and money.

Damien Fortune described their dramatic meeting in a London toilet. He said: "I went right over to him and put my arms around him. His main concern is Scientology. They have him all perked up. You could call it hypnosis." Another brother, Diarmuid was angered that he was refused permission to meet his brother. "the reason they said was that I was too aggressive. They're claiming he is a free person and he can make up his own mind. But yet a senior member told me I was too aggressive to meet him."

The family claims Odhran was mentally coerced into returning to the church. When he returned to Gorey in December a family psychiatrist said he was too ill to return to the cult. His sister Denys explained: "The way things have turned we're scared. The whole family is distraught. I can't believe his personality could have changed to much in a few hours." And Denys warned of the dangers of going through the Scientologists' initiation personality test. She said: "A personality test can go on for 30 years. Once you go in, they'll keep you on the mailing list. Personality tests are disguised as harmless but it will always turn out negatively. It's just a scam." "I'm not going to give up. I can't give up my own flesh and blood. My love for my brother will not be quenched," she said.

By Gary O'Shea

Scientology rewrites founders life story

This is a religion which devotes as much attention to members' bank accounts as to their spiritual wellbeing,

writes Susan McKay

The church of Scientology was set up in the early 1950's by the American science fiction writer, Lafayette Ron Hubbard - known as Ron. At first he put the emphasis on its scientific credentials, as religion was going through an unfashionable phase. However, since it was quickly clear that his idea lacked the most basic foundation in science, Hubbard swiftly and shrewdly opted to promote the religious angle. His aim was - simply - to rid the earth of his enemies, extracting their every penny in the process.

Hubbard was his own most bizarre invention. He claimed to be a nuclear physicist and war hero, and styled himself a naval commodore, surrounding himself with young women "messengers". He was none of these things, though the church he left behind continues to promote this entirely fictional account of his life's achievement. The church of Scientology claims to have 8 million members worldwide. Its headquaters are in Los Angeles, and it has been run since Hubbard's death in 1986 by the inner circle of his latter years, when he had become totally paranoid, reclusive and extremely rich. His church had bank accounts scattered around the world, which he could tap for personal use. He left $650m and inumerable lavish properties.

According to its president, the Reverend Heber Jentzsch, scientology is far more precious than dollars, helping people to achieve their dreams and promising enhanced intelligence. In recent years, the conversion to scientology of film stars like Tom Cruise, Nicole Kidman and John Travolta, have given it a glamourous image. But experts in cult religions take a different view. Jim Siegelman typically described scientology as "possibly the most dangerous of all the cults" Siegelman said that people who have left the scientologists suffer memory loss, insomnia, acute anxiety, depression, hallucination and bewildering psychic experiences for many years. There is also a high level of suicide, and a French court recently jailed a scientologist leader for causing the suicide of a member who was unable to pay what the church claimed he owed it. "They shut down the mind, systematically," according to Siegelman.

Money becomes an issue very quickly when the scientologists start to work on a new recruit. It is part of their billion year contract with the church that they should proselytise and the financial purpose of this is made explicit in directives which urge them to "make money" and "make more money". the scientologists will target individuals whom they identify as "ruins", that is people with an obvious problem or vulnerability. They will persuade the ruin to be "audited", a process of making the person feel extremely bad about themselves and extracting confessions about all shameful episodes, secrets and mis demeanours in the person's past. The person is then told that a scientology course is the only thing that will help them to improve, and that their life will otherwise be hopeless. These bizarre courses cost a lot.

When they are over another, even more expensive, course is suggested. And so on.There are also "purifications", involving recruits taking massive doses of vitamin pills followed by vigourous excercise and long saunas, after which many are hallucinating, disorientated, and in a perfect condition to sign up for further courses, regardless of their realistic ability to pay. The scientologists are adept at finding out how much money a victim has access to, and at persuading people to empty bank accounts, take out loans, sell their car, remorgage their house, cash in their life assurance and pensions, even take in scientology lodgers. One ex-scientologist estimated that the church takes half a million dollars a week in "donations" (exempt from VAT and other levies) which are actually mostly fees.

What the "ruin" gets for their money isinduction into the "secrets" left behind by the prolific Hubbard, and policed by his inheritors. They learn that they are part of a project to "clear the planet" which means bringing people up, via a metaphoric bridge to the secret "Operating Thetan Levels". After parting with about $20,000, you will learn that 75 million years ago an evil ruler, Zemu, was deposed. He then "goofed the floof" and in the process the populations of thousands of planets were herded together on earth using hydrogen bombs placed in volcanoes. The blasted out Thetans attach themselves to humans and have to be expelled, via scientology. At this esoteric stage, you will be paying out around $600 an hour. Hubbard and his inheritors were well aware of the need to keep the reality of scientology hidden from the eyes of those who had not sucumbed to it.

Those who leave are known as enemies, and Hubbard directed that they were to be regarded as "fair game". "They may be deprived of property, injured by any means, tricked, sued, lied to or destroyed", he wrote. Former scientologists have been threatened with the exposure of secrets told during supposedly confidential audits, and names and home addresses have been publicised. The BBC has made a number of damning documentaries about scientology in Britain, using undercover reporters with secret cameras. Scientologists have been jailed in several countries for harming people and for fraud. But the scientologists dismiss all this. They compare their situation with that of the Jews under Nazism. Journalists, they say, are simply "irredeemably evil".

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