Scientology

[sir_pudding]

Is it really cool to attack a real world religion like this? Wouldn't listing infernal patrons for LDS or Islam get you in trouble? I think all religons are bogus, but I'm trying real hard to treat them all with some amount of courtesy in public. What makes Scientololgy any different from the rest of them? Doesn't the Line Editor have some connection to Scientology?

[Rocket Man]

I don't think we're attacking it at all; part of the nature of a game like this is that it does take up the issue of real-world religions and where they would weigh in on the War. (Please note that I included both infernal and angelic possibilities for the church's opponents, and that another poster did the same for the source of the E-Meter.)

The big boys aren't necessarily immune, for that matter. Note that the Archangel listed as a dedicated patron of Islam, until recently, was the one closest to a Fall -- to the point where there was a writeup of his Demon Prince form in case a campaign went that way. And there's at least one demon in Liber Servitorum who claims to have posed as Christ ... though he is a Balseraph, so you can take what he says with an entire salt mine.

[sir_pudding]

Originally Posted by Rocket Man

I don't think we're attacking it at all; part of the nature of a game like this is that it does take up the issue of real-world religions and where they would weigh in on the War. (Please note that I included both infernal and angelic possibilities for the church's opponents, and that another poster did the same for the source of the E-Meter.)

Fair enough, nevermind.

EDIT: Although wouldn't calling Christ, Mohammed or Joseph Smith "a delusional paranoid with a greedy streak" be inappropriate? I may think these things (in fact for the most part I do), but saying them seems to be considered rude.

[naraht]

I think part of the issue with Scientology is that IN groups Religions into the following.
1)Abrahamic (including the 19th/20th century split offs like the Mormons, the Christian Scientists, Unification Church (Moonies) etc)
2) Buddhist
3) Eastern Philosophies that aren't really capital R religions from an IN standpoint (Confusianism/Shinto)
4) Dead religions (Greek, Norse, Aztec)
with a few oddball categories like the Christian Syncretic (Loa, Voudun) and the Wiccans.

I can't think of any religion other than Scientology in the Western World that is both organized and which doesn't trace at least some of its Religion to the Adam/Noah/Abraham of the Jewish Bible (or some close variant thereof).

[Flyndaran]

There's also the fact that many don't consider it a real religion at all. I almost want to call it a Church of Mammon. But that might offend people.
I'm sure all the modern big religions had the same issue back in the day.
But with IN, and its verifiable truths, it can't be acceptable in game, no matter the real world issues.

[naraht]

Originally Posted by naraht

I can't think of any religion other than Scientology in the Western World that is both organized and which doesn't trace at least some of its Religion to the Adam/Noah/Abraham of the Jewish Bible (or some close variant thereof).

My wife reminded me of Raelism as another one that falls into this category.

[Matthias Wasser]

Leveling blasphemies at historical and mythological figures within the context of the game world should be, I think, obviously okay. Portraying all e.g. all Christians as credulous fanatics, by contrast, is problematic for the same reason doing so in any work of fiction is problematic, and discussing whether an historical figure was a fraud in the actual world is off-topic.

That said, my take in-world would be something like:

• Scientology is one of several Pleasure Religion prototypes. It was started by sorcerers in cooperation with various of their infernal contacts, and like anything else remains a primarily human-driven project, although major parts of the Sea Org are consciously infernally aligned.
• The Church's progressing levels of attainment serve not only as a source of funding but help to identify those with sorcerous potential, who are trained in their gifts as promised. (Those without are of course welcome to hand over their money and advance along fake levels of attainment.) Counted as a unit, it is probably the largest cabal in the world. Depending on the echelon various techniques like essence level reading and past life recollection are performed through a combination of cold reading and actual supernatural assessment.
• Angels of Lightning and Flowers and their human allies are engaged in a major project to reduce human variability, assertiveness, and individuality, while making them more productive and prosocial, through psychopharmacology. Not everything the Church says on the subject is true, but the basic picture of a vast supernatural conspiracy to remake humanity into complaisant worker bees through psychiatry is basically correct.
• Scientologist practice, like any other, functions as divine religion depending on the intentionality and attitude of the religious practicioner at the time. While all else being equal this is not to be preferred, it's hard to make a religion really appealing without divine aspects and potential - hence why there are so many Pleasure Religion prototypes out there in the first place - and this-worldly goals and countering the divine psychiatric conspiracy have meant that purity on this front is easily sacrificed. It's the largest organized PR prototype in the world precisely because it's made some of the deepest compromises with divine practice.
• The Xenu stuff isn't, necessarily, a much more distorted picture of the war in Heaven than that of Abrahamic mythology, although it is of course quite distorted. The text (i.e. the game In Nomine) uses the language of Abrahamic mythology, but really it's much weirder than that.
• Kyriotates think it's really funny when groups like Anonymous are like "we're decentralized! Therefore we're free and spontaneous!" (Kyriotates have a lot to laugh at in late modern ideology.)
• Hubbard is still involved with the organization, although he spends most of his time writing schlocky science fiction - the series he co-writes with Ayn Rand is up to 15,000 pages - and pestering Aleister Crowley to let him into his research group.

[ladyarcana55]

Originally Posted by naraht

My wife reminded me of Raelism as another one that falls into this category.

Believe it or not, a lot of their important stuff is based on Buddhist teachings. I know this because I used ti study it for a bit.

[Flyndaran]

Originally Posted by ladyarcana55

Believe it or not, a lot of their important stuff is based on Buddhist teachings. I know this because I used ti study it for a bit.

Sugar coated bitter pill?
Or easy to swallow a lie when wrapped in a truth or half-truth.
Or True innovation is rare even for bad science fiction writers.

[ISNorden]

Originally Posted by Matthias Wasser

Leveling blasphemies at historical and mythological figures within the context of the game world should be, I think, obviously okay. Portraying all e.g. all Christians as credulous fanatics, by contrast, is problematic for the same reason doing so in any work of fiction is problematic, and discussing whether an historical figure was a fraud in the actual world is off-topic.

Please accept my apology for the inflammatory language I used to describe L. Ron Hubbard: My intended point was that any leader with a bad reputation can be crazy, selfish, or something worse, without automatically being a direct minion of Hell in game terms.

Originally Posted by Matthias Wasser

That said, my take in-world would be something like:[LIST][*]Scientology is one of several Pleasure Religion prototypes. It was started by sorcerers in cooperation with various of their infernal contacts, and like anything else remains a primarily human-driven project, although major parts of the Sea Org are consciously infernally aligned. [*]The Church's progressing levels of attainment serve not only as a source of funding but help to identify those with sorcerous potential, who are trained in their gifts as promised. (Those without are of course welcome to hand over their money and advance along fake levels of attainment.) Counted as a unit, it is probably the largest cabal in the world. Depending on the echelon various techniques like essence level reading and past life recollection are performed through a combination of cold reading and actual supernatural assessment.

Hmmm...definitely worth considering, especially in a bright/high contrast campaign. In a game that accepts superhuman powers as real, the CoS wouldn't claim that upper-level members can learn some of those powers and not show off a few bigwigs as proof!

Originally Posted by Matthias Wasser

[*]Angels of Lightning and Flowers and their human allies are engaged in a major project to reduce human variability, assertiveness, and individuality, while making them more productive and prosocial, through psychopharmacology. Not everything the Church says on the subject is true, but the basic picture of a vast supernatural conspiracy to remake humanity into complaisant worker bees through psychiatry is basically correct.[*]Scientologist practice, like any other, functions as divine religion depending on the intentionality and attitude of the religious practicioner at the time. While all else being equal this is not to be preferred, it's hard to make a religion really appealing without divine aspects and potential - hence why there are so many Pleasure Religion prototypes out there in the first place - and this-worldly goals and countering the divine psychiatric conspiracy have meant that purity on this front is easily sacrificed. It's the largest organized PR prototype in the world precisely because it's made some of the deepest compromises with divine practice.

This attitude fits better with backwards/low-contrast play: Hell created Scientology as a tool for liberating mankind from Heaven's mindless conformity. Lilith endorses the Church's idea that knowledge is power, and power is true Freedom; but Fleurity condemns Scientology for its strong anti-drug teachings.

Originally Posted by Matthias Wasser

[*]The Xenu stuff isn't, necessarily, a much more distorted picture of the war in Heaven than that of Abrahamic mythology, although it is of course quite distorted. The text (i.e. the game In Nomine) uses the language of Abrahamic mythology, but really it's much weirder than that.

I've read some materials which imply that Abrahamic religion is a fiction concocted by Xenu, and shown to the deported aliens as an "in-flight movie" on their trip to Teegeeack. If what I read is genuine CoS doctrine, then it's easy to imagine Nybbas or some other Prince manipulating the ethereal Xenu, having him convince church members that the War in Heaven is a fake. (Sounds like a bizarre offshoot of the "ethereal Yahweh" heresy, doesn't it?)