outside Celebrity Centre; newspaper article titled “Scientology–A Long Trail of Controversy”; another shot of Celebrity Centre; part of newspaper article title “struggle for credibility” VO: Over its rocky 45- year history, Scientology has driven for mainstream acceptance. DAVID MISCAVIGE (interview): People have been searching for thousands of years for spiritual release and freedom, and what we have in Scientology is the answer. How to achieve that. JOHN TRAVOLTA (on movie set in Army camouflage outfit): Ultimately, the whole purpose is to ...

CLEARWATER, Fla. - Dec 6, 1998 - "I am L. Ron Hubbard," the woman on the hotel room bed announced in a robotic voice. "I created time 3 billion years ago." She rambled on and on, every outburst dutifully scribbled down by those assigned to watch her. "I can't confront force . . . I need my auditor . . . I want to take a toothbrush and brush the floor until I have a cognition." The jargon of Scientology was ...

She is one of an estimated 3,300 Scientologists who have migrated to Clearwater in the 1990s, the most dramatic period of growth for the church during its 22 years in Clearwater. In addition, the church has said it is "deadly serious" about its plans for the year 2000, which include tripling the size of its Clearwater staff to more than 3,500; launching a local Scientology "university" that would accommodate more than 10,000 students a week; and having "Clearwater known as the ...

CLEARWATER, Fla. — Late on a November afternoon two years ago, a 36-year-old Scientologist named Lisa McPherson was involved in a minor traffic accident. She was not injured, but she inexplicably stripped off her clothes and began to walk naked down the street. A paramedic rushed her into an ambulance and asked why she had taken off her clothes. Ms. McPherson replied: "I wanted help. I wanted help." She was taken to a nearby hospital for a psychiatric examination, but several ...

EDUCATION: Organizer of a conference being held today is a Scientologist, and that worries' some in the school-reform group. ORANGE — Leaders of Orange County's "back to basics" education movement are split over attending a conference tonight because the chief organizer belongs to the Church of Scientology. Orange County Department of Education board member Ken Williams said he withdrew from the "Back to Basics Education Crusade" because of discomfort with its organizers, not because of disagreement over the crusade's goals. "I ...

BONN, June 6 — The German authorities decided today to place the Scientology movement under nationwide surveillance for one year, their sharpest action yet in a long battle against a group they say is bent on undermining their democratic society. The decision, which critics called authoritarian and impractical, means that Scientologists' mail may be intercepted, their phones tapped and their offices infiltrated by undercover agents posing as adherents. The organization said it would contest the decision in court. By making public ...

WASHINGTON — The State Department's annual survey of human rights conditions around the world will contain expanded, toughened language criticizing Germany for restrictions on the Church of Scientology and its members, administration officials say. The report, to be issued Wednesday, will chastise Germany for what a senior administration official called "a campaign of harassment and intimidation" against the controversial church. He said the United States, seeking to protect religious freedom, has urged Germany through diplomatic channels "not to prosecute people for ...

Lawmakers are looking at barring its members from teaching, police work, other government jobs. HAMBURG, Germany — As the politicians see it, Germany, is being threatened by an evil plot to infiltrate business and government. "A giant octopus . . . that will stop at nothing in its desire to spread its blind ideology" is how Labor Secretary Norbert Blum has described the plot against Germany. Claudia Nolte, another member of Chancellor Helmut Kohl's Cabinet, warns, "They aim at world domination ...

Since its founding in 1954, the Church of Scientology has sparked some fear, mistrust and controversy. This doesn't surprise the Rev. Lee Holzinger, 38, minister of the Santa Barbara Church of Scientology. "We are different from other churches in many ways," he said. "How could anything come along that is so fundamentally important to life and society and not rouse controversy?" The church was involved in a 40-year battle with the Internal Revenue Service that ended Oct 1, 1993 when the ...

Scientology is the religion everyone loves to hate. So how come so many movie stars are devout followers? Moves into the church's Celebrity Centre for an exclusive look at the starway to heaven. AT FRANKLIN AND BRONSON A LOGJAM OF LIMousines crawls toward the mock-French Normandy Chateau. At the grand doorway, celebrities, lawyers, producers, and the children of the well-heeled of the entertainment industry step onto the crimson-carpeted tarmac, chattering through the pink-and-gold lounge to the lawns and fairy-lit trees beyond, ...

As the Church of Scientology battles a band of cyberspace dissidents - seizing computers and papers from the homes of vocal online critics in the past two weeks - local defectors charge they are being harassed for speaking out against the church. Robert Vaughn Young and Stacy Young, longtime staff members who left the Church of Scientology in 1989, complained to police that Scientologists have picketed their house in West Seattle at least five times in the past two weeks. They ...

ARLINGTON, Va., Aug. 13 — The Church of Scientology is battling a band of on-line dissidents who have used the Internet to mail out globally its secret scriptures, for which some members must pay thousands of dollars. On Saturday, as a result of a copyright infringement lawsuit, United States marshals here seized the computer of a former church employee who had electronically posted a 136-page text that he said was available in court records. The former employee, Arnaldo P. Lerma, 44, ...

[Picture / Caption: Linda Hostetler, with her husband, Dan, is battling the Church of Scientology.] ROYAL OAK — At first glance, Linda Hostetler appears the vibrant, independent woman who answered a personal ad eight years ago, beckoning her to join the Church of Scientology. But a closer look reveals a puzzled 29-year-old woman, emotionally scarred by years of what she termed "psychological torture," and financially ruined by a much-maligned yet resilient and powerful empire into which she said she not only ...

HAMBURG, Germany — It would take something like an invasion of space aliens — maybe something out of an L. Ron Hubbard science fiction novel — to match the climate of fear and mutual suspicion that prevails between the Church of Scientology that Mr. Hubbard created and its frightened opponents in Germany. "Fear is part of their system — it's a totalitarian organization that seeks to control everybody else, a dictatorship," said Ursula Caberta y Diaz, who heads the four-member working ...

Is the Church of Scientology a religion, or a multimillion-dollar corporate cult? Some former Scientologists have spoken of spending thousands of dollars or working long hours without food or sleep to pay off debts to the church. The church characterizes itself as misunderstood and persecuted, emphasizing testimonials and community outreach activities, while attempting to discredit critics. "Scientology is a racket," says Bloomfield Hills attorney Constance Cumbey, who has handled four Michigan lawsuits against the church. "That's not to say that everyone ...

TEENAGER David McLaren is in hiding, after breaking free from the Scientology cult. "I'm the one who got away," said the brave 18-year-old, who came forward to help Scots girl Christine Forsyth. "I found freedom, now I want Christine to enjoy that same freedom", he said. Last week we told the shocking story of how 24-year-old Christine, from Kirkcaldy, was "tried" for "treason" by the mind-bending cult. HER CRIME WAS SPEAKING TO AN "OUTSIDER". Christine's distraught dad begged the cult to ...

BRITAIN is home to more than 500 religious cults with an estimated 500,000 believers, many of whose children are subjected to ritual abuse, a conference was told yesterday. The conference at Hull University, organised in response to the Waco siege in Texas last year, was attended by 150 psychologists alarmed at the effects on children of bizarre teachings by the cults. Ritually abused children are subject to prostitution and pornography in the name of religion, it was claimed. The Cults and ...

Police are investigating complaints that private investigators employed by the Church of Scientology, the cult created by L. Ron Hubbard, have intimidated witnesses and plaintiffs in forthcoming court cases. The cult, which claims to have 300,000 members in Britain and 8m worldwide, has attempted to undermine its critics after coming under severe financial pressure in this country. It is anxious to protect its funds which are set to be drained further by a series of expensive civil actions brought by former ...

Special investigation by chief reporter PAUL BRACCHI [A very small picture of Mr. Bracchi is shown.] [A picture of a man in a long military coat with brass buttons is shown. Below the picture is this title: "A Scientologist out on liberty time in a miliary-style greatcoat."] THEY dress like naval officers. But the uniforms, complete with epaulettes and brass buttons, are not what they seem. These men and women do not belong to the armed services...they are Scientologists. Most of ...