Scientology, the California-based religion with ties to the entertainment world, seems to be making a push for even greater mainstream acceptance. In the past few weeks, both Fox News and Hard Copy, the Paramount-produced tabloid news show, have run strangely upbeat pieces about the new Scientology center in Kansas and the group's recent benefit concert at Isaac Tigrett's House of Blues in Hollywood. The hooks for both pieces were the newly accessible Scientologized celebrities John Travolta and wife Kelly Preston and ...

IT IS portrayed as a typical private school. But the glossy Greenfields brochure, which boasts of academic success and a happy environment for children, does not tell the whole story. One important word is missing from the booklet - Scientology. It is also missing from: * The handbook issued by the Independent Schools Information Service, which describes Greenfields as inter-denominational. * The Independent Schools Yearbook, which it is listed as non-denominational. * The school's 27-page constitution lodged with the Charity Commission. ...

GRAHAM E. BERRY, State Bar No. 128503 GORDON J. CALHOUN, State Bar No. 84509 LEWIS, D'AMATO, BRISBOIS & BISGAARD 221 N. Figueroa Street, Suite 1200 Los Angeles, California 90012 Telephone: (213) 250-1800 Attorneys for Defendants UWE GEERTZ, PH.D. UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT CENTRAL DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA No. CV 91-6426 HLH (Tx) DECLARATION OF VICKI AZNARAN RE: MOTION FOR COSTS Date: APRIL 4, 1994 Time: 10:00 a.m. Courtroom: 7 CHURCH OF SCIENTOLOGY INTERNATIONAL, Plaintiff, VS. STEVEN FISHMAN and UWE GEERTZ, Defendants. —– ...

At trial over Scientologist's suit, Sally Jessy Raphael testifies to defend herself and freedom of the press. Sally Jessy Raphael canceled her show today to testify in an Ann Arbor courtroom, saying she wants to defend the freedom of the press, but she also has to defend herself. The television talk show host is one of several defendants in a $72 million lawsuit brought by a member of the Church of Scientology who claimed Raphael's show maligned her and her faith. ...

In 1975, the Church of Scientology used a front company to secretly buy the historic Fort Harrison Hotel in downtown Clearwater for $2.3-million. There has been controversy ever since. Shortly after making the hotel its worldwide spiritual headquarters, Scientologists issued an internal directive outlining a plan to "fully investigate the Clearwater city and county area so we can distinguish our friends from our enemies and handle as needed." It called for protecting "ourselves against any potential threat by taking control of ...

Now [Nancy] Cartwright is appearing on television in another role: a 30-minute television program that the Church of Scientology hopes will expose more people to [L. Ron] Hubbard's message and increase the number of people seeking Scientology counseling. Now, next to those telephone-order woks and real-estate courses comes Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health, the 1950 self-help classic from Hubbard, whose writings and research are the gospel of Scientology. The group has its spiritual headquarters in Clearwater. Scientology is never ...

DECLARATION OF MARGERY WAKEFIELD I, Margery Wakefield, having personal knowledge of the following, hereby declare: 1. I was a member of the Church of Scientology of California from October of 1968 until February of 1980. I joined the Church in Los Angeles, California, where I was primarily based although I also took courses and/or worked at Church organizations in St. Louis, Washington, D.C., Atlanta, Georgia and Miami, Florida. 2. While in Scientology I progressed to the level of OT 3 (an ...

And now, the next Walt Disney Studios— the Church of Scientology! That is, if entrepreneurs connected with the Hollywood based cult can muscle into the film business with their proposal to homogenize films by tailoring them to the tastes of the unwashed masses. It all began last July, when Future Films, a new, eccentric studio, began running ads in Variety and the Hollywood Reporter touting its revolutionary ideas. No one knew what to make of it all. The grand concept, to ...

L. Ron Hubbard was a writer who conjured up tales of time travel and rocket ships to Mars. But science fiction was not all that sprang from Hubbard's pen. He also wrote the book Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health. In it, Hubbard described a new kind of counseling, which he said could help people increase their IQs, cure themselves of arthritis, allergies, asthma and migraine headaches, and reduce their chances of having a car wreck. The book was published ...

[Parent document: Dianetics Foundation International (DFI): Form 1023 filing.]

[Parent document: Dianetics Foundation International (DFI): Form 1023 filing.]

A personal aide to Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard for eight of her nearly 20 years with the group says that fluoxetine (Prozac) and therapy have finally stopped the depression and suicidal ideation she had suffered since 1976. "I have to speak out." Hana (Eltringham) Whitfield told The Psychiatric Times. "The Scientologists choose the most prominent psychiatrists and the most successful drugs to attack. That's why they attacked Ritalin, and that's why they are now attacking Prozac." Although ...

There is Pepsi-Cola, there is Gillette, there is Eastman Kodak and Fruit Of The Loom. And then there is Dianetics. Wherever there has been Goodwill Games, there has been Dianetics. As one of 12 worldwide sponsors of the international athletic competition, Dianetics has been very visible — on television screens, the sides of buses, banners, even behind the goal of the Tri-Cities hockey rink. In the University District earlier this week, a huge tent at Northeast 50th Street and University Way ...

The Church of Scientology began as a pseudo-scientific healing cult, Dianetics, described by L. Ron Hubbard, a science fiction writer, in his best-selling book "Dianetics: The Modern science of Mental Health" (1950). At first, Dianetics attracted followers by promising to cure psychiatric and psychosomatic disorders through a procedure called "dianetic auditing," based on pop-psychology, hypnosis, and cybernetics. Hubbard's theory as based on the principle that people can achieve health through abolishing ("clearing") negative influences ("engrams") from their minds by going back ...

As part of its strategy, the movement created a nationwide uproar over the drug Ritalin, used to treat hyperactive children. In recent years, a national debate flared over Ritalin, a drug used for more than three decades to treat hyperactivity in children. Across the country, multimillion-dollar lawsuits were filed by parents who contended that their children had been harmed by the drug. Major news organizations—including The Times—devoted extensive coverage to whether youngsters were being turned into emotionally disturbed addicts by psychiatrists ...

Call it one of the most remarkable success stories in modern publishing history. Since late 1985, at least 20 books by Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard have become bestsellers. In March of 1988, nearly four decades after its initial publication, Hubbard's "Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health" was No. 1 on virtually every best-seller list in the country–including the New York Times. Ten hardcover science fiction novels Hubbard completed before his death four years ago also became bestsellers, four of ...

It was a triumph of galactic proportions: Science fiction writer L. Ron Hubbard had discarded the body that bound him to the physical universe and was off to the next phase of his spiritual exploration — "on a planet a galaxy away." "Hip, hip, hurray!" thousands of Scientologists thundered inside the Hollywood Palladium, where they had just been told of this remarkable feat. "Hip, hip, hurray! Hip, hip, hurray!" they continued to chant, gazing at a large photograph of Hubbard, creator ...

The Church of Scientology's genesis was the 1950 best seller by L. Ron Hubbard, "Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health." Church officials claim there are 7 million Scientologists worldwide, but former members allege there may be fewer than 100,000. The church promotes Scientology as a religion — one not based on the worship of a god but on the belief in "scientific" principles applied to the mind. Hubbard argued in "Dianetics" that inner turmoil springs from subconscious mental images, or ...

A television network has decided to broadcast commercials from a sponsor that is affiliated with the Church of Scientology. Turner Broadcasting System (TBS) said Monday that it will allow Bridge Publications to be one of 12 companies sponsoring the 1990 Goodwill Games. [...]

The Goodwill Games, an Olympic-style competition designed to bring people together, is prompting protests because one of its sponsors is affiliated with the Church of Scientology. Turner Broadcasting System (TBS) has received complaints from people upset that Bridge Publications is one of 12 companies that paid millions to become worldwide sponsors, spokesmen for the games said. The games were founded in 1986 by TBS president Ted Turner and are broadcast by TBS. Mike Mobley of TBS did not know the number ...

Alan Kellman and Curt Larson share a long and unabashed commitment to the Church of Scientology — a loyalty that is rare in the peripatetic "network of seekers," according to one scholar. Gary Shepherd, an Oakland University sociology professor, says membership is often transient in groups like the Church of Scientology "because people become disillusioned with the unreality, the commitment becomes too great or their therapeutic needs have been met and they no longer require the help of Scientology or Dianetics." ...