Scientology gets the jump on the holidays (that it believes are an alien plot)

There’s definitely a nip in the air here in New York as the first of our major autumn milestones, Halloween, is less than two weeks away.

But while it was still late September, Scientology sent out mailers that indicated it was not waiting to get a jump on one of its favorite times of year. Yes, we’re talking about that hallowed tradition, the Hijacking Christmas For Xenu Season!

You see, Scientology is all about running with this wild paradox: On the one hand, it’s this totally controlling and obsessively intrusive organization that puts people through entirely fanciful past-life therapy to convince them that billions of years ago they were bloodthirsty space pirates wiping out whole civilizations with laser guns and whatnot. While at the same time, for the public at large it pretends to be this exceedingly wholesome self-help outfit that simply wants to be considered a mainstream “religion” and not a mind-bending totalitarian menace at all.

How it has gotten away with this for more than 70 years now is one of life’s great mysteries.

Anyway, perhaps the most glaring example of this paradox is Scientology’s annual embracing of Christmas as another of the ways it markets itself. As a result, you will soon see “Winter Wonderland” installations spring up in places like Los Angeles and Clearwater, Florida, where the public, and especially their children, are invited to come take part in holiday fun in a familiar setting that features old St. Nick himself.

And this year, Scientology’s cruise ship got into the fun, putting out this September invitation to make plans to spend your holidays in the Caribbean with the jolly old elf himself!

Experience the Magic

Wrap up the year with the gift that keeps on giving by coming to the Freewinds, where you'll gain OT Tech to power you in life and up the Bridge. A trip on our OT Ship is even more magical during the holidays. The decks are decked out, trees are trimmed, a gingerbread Ship makes sweet waves, Santa is on board for festivities and our Christmas concert features a galaxy of stars. So come aboard for the holidays and bring the whole family.

Doesn’t that look like fun?

OK, so where’s the paradox, you may ask. After all, don’t many people and institutions and businesses put on the trappings of the holiday as merely a secular celebration of the longest nights of the year and a toast to getting through the coming winter?

Sure, for many of us Christmas is about shopping and decorations on trees and nostalgic tunes and certainly not about the birth of Jesus or the Roman holiday of Saturnalia that the early Christian celebration co-opted.

But there’s a special reason why Scientology’s use of Christmas as a marketing tool is especially cynical. And that becomes clear if you have taken the time to listen to L. Ron Hubbard’s infamous October 3, 1968 “Assists” lecture.

We took that trip in detail in 2018 and posted Hubbard’s original audio, which you can still listen to. Speaking to his Sea Org recruits aboard the yacht Apollo during those years when he was running Scientology from his ship, Hubbard explains how religions on this planet are all a hoax that the galactic ruler Xenu implanted in thetans with the use of a 3D “super colossal motion picture.”

This was 75 million years ago, when this world was known by its galactic federation name of Teegeeack. The result is that all these millions of years later, the thetans inhabiting human bodies on Earth today don’t realize that when they exercise a religion they’re actually worshiping figures who were inventions of Xenu’s mean trick and his super colossal 3D movie.

“There was no Christ,” Hubbard says at one point as he explains how fragments of this “R6” implant from Xenu have been picked up by today’s religions in various ways.

Thankfully, Ron says, Scientology (and only Scientology) can now wipe away the R6 implant and free thetans from this menace.

And that’s why it’s so especially sneaky and crass that Scientology, which believes that Christmas is part of a plot to enslave mankind, puts on the trappings of the holiday in order to pull in more suckers for its own moneymaking enslavement scheme.

So sure, come aboard and bring the whole family!

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Observer investigation gets Narconon in hot water

One of the things Apostate Alex has been busy with is getting news organizations in the UK interested in Scientology’s controversies. And one of the results of that was a thorough investigation by the Observer of Scientology’s quack rehab network, Narconon, which runs a single clinic in England.

Today, the newspaper is reporting that as a result of that investigation, the country’s Charity Commission has sent some sternly-worded communications to Narconon about its governance, but it can’t really do anything about the way it actually puts patients through a risky combination of sauna treatments and Scientology exercises.

Sadly, what reporter Shanti Das discovered was that, much like in the US, there is very little to no government oversight of sham drug rehabs (and Scientology isn’t the only one in that business)…

The Charity Commission’s intervention comes in the absence of involvement from other regulators. While the Care Quality Commission (CQC) oversees substance misuse services, it has suggested Narconon does not fall within its remit because its approach is “alternative.” Records obtained under freedom of information laws show that between 2019 and 2023, the watchdog received 14 complaints that it did not formally investigate or escalate, saying it had no duty to do so. There is no other regulator overseeing substance misuse services.

Scientology long ago figured out that the government, and the public to a large degree, just doesn’t give a crap about addicts.

If the Narconon scam has retreated to a large degree in this country (from a high of about 21 clinics down to only 5 today), it’s a result of litigation by former patients and their families, and not because of any effort on the part of government regulators or politicians.

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Thank you for reading today’s story here at Substack. For the full picture of what’s happening today in the world of Scientology, please join the conversation at tonyortega.org, where we’ve been reporting daily on David Miscavige’s cabal since 2012. There you’ll find additional stories, and our popular regular daily features:

Source Code: Actual things founder L. Ron Hubbard said on this date in history

Avast, Ye Mateys: Snapshots from Scientology’s years at sea

Overheard in the Freezone: Indie Hubbardism, one thought at a time

Past is Prologue: From this week in history at alt.religion.scientology

Random Howdy: Your daily dose of the Captain

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