Recently, I found out that David Miscavige, the international head of the church of scientology, the pseudo-religion founded by L. Ron Hubbard, grew up in my hometown, Willingboro, NJ.   A friend of mine on Facebook, sent me a link that discussed his ‘rise to the top’. Oh sure he and his family moved around a bit but he spent about 10 or 12 years in the old ‘Boro. He was the best man at Tom Cruise’s third marriage to Katie Holmes. And speaking of movie stars, John Travolta, is also a scientologist. Both of these guys have reached the pinnacle of status in this (so called) church and are “cleared”….meaning they are at the highest level. I think both of these men are terrific actors and it would probably be a very cool thing to have a beer with them.  But I think they are sadly on their way to fire and brimstone. Oh I’m sure scientologists would disagree. I’m sure they are some very nice people with high moral standards, but having good morals means nothing if God/Jesus is not a part of your life. Remember, who is the truth and who is the way? It is certainly not Mr. Hubbard, Mr. Miscavige, Mr. Cruise or Mr. Travolta

The church of Scientology is a cult, not a religion. It costs members a ton of money to advance in this cult as Mr. Cruise and Mr. Travolta have done. Of course, money is no object to them and there they sit on the top rung of the so-called hierarchy of scientology. There is so much mystery surrounding this sect, it is almost to the extent of the freemasons.  David Miscavige will never do a TV interview because there is simply too much to hide. The church, however,  is international and has groups on almost every continent… but luckily, I read that its growth has slowed in recent years. Although I have just looked into this and don’t know ‘everything’ about scientology, the fact is that it is a sham based on aliens coming to this world. There is absolutely no room in their teaching for God. Every member is his or her own god. The true God of the universe does not exist for them. If I may borrow a fact from Fr. Larry Richards, Tom Cruise was actually a seminarian in the Catholic Church before he became an actor. When asked why he switched to scientology, he replied…’within the Catholic Church, there are so many restrictive rules to follow: within scientology, we make our own rules.’  The ultimate sin of pride, replacing God with yourself….putting yourself higher than God. Isn’t that what got Adam and Eve in trouble?

Again, this leads me back to the title of this blog….God makes the rules, Not us. We as Catholics have a gold mine within our grasp. It is the promise of heaven with Jesus showing us the way. It is an undisputed fact that Jesus founded the Catholic church. Some may call it man-made. I call it “GodMan-made” because Jesus was/is the GodMan. We may not be able to convince Tom or John to reconsider and convert back to Catholicism, but we can pray for their conversion and the conversion of all other non-Catholics. With our prayers, the Holy Spirit, in his time, will unite us all.