would you consider it to be a religon? and what is i have never heard of it until recently?

a-sassy-black-lady :

Sure. They have spiritual beliefs, a purpose, and whatnot. Even if false, it's still a religion.

Txgangsta : i understand that im just really curious as to what there all about

a-sassy-black-lady :

Oh, sorry.

Scientology is the belief that men are held back from their full potential by body theatans. These theatans can be removed in a ritual of the religion and their goal is enlightenment, before or after death.

Here's their official website. Note that they're commonly considered a cult, so take their claims on reality with a grain of salt.

http://www.scientology.org/

Scientology was actually founded by a science fiction writer. L. Ron Hubbard. It's really just a money making scam, you literally have to pay to "advance" through the religion. They've been known to sell "auditing packages" to grieving people who have lost someone, and it supposedly cures them of their grief... It doesn't, it just puts them in debt.

I despise scientology actually.

sloanstar1000 : If people want to pay money and feel better about themselves, why not let them?  Christianity recommends 10% or more of your income as donation to churches to support them.  Tithing and buy favors has been around for two thousand years.  Heck, indulgences were the only way into Heaven for Catholics many years ago.  That's why Martin Luther wrote his proclamation.

There is scandal, abuse, and cheating in all religions.  Hubbard wasn't the first to come up with this idea.  And if a person can find solace, even at the cost of X amount of dollars, good for them.

If you despise Scientology for just that, you better hate all the other religions too, Sloan.

warmaker : I do in fact hate all religions, some are worse than others, but since this thread was about scientology, I figured I'd only complain about this one here.

sloanstar1000 : Hate is an awfully strong word.  Religions often do good around the world.  Take various branches of Christianity.  They created the YMCA, for example, and other organizations that help people with food, water, education, and other important social aspects.  Jewish groups, Muslin groups, and others do the same.

Why hate?

warmaker : Sure, hate is a strong word, and so is despise. Maybe instead of saying that I hate all religions, I should say I hate fundamentalist religion. Sure, Some religious people have done great things, and created great organizations, so have non-religious people. It's beside the point. I hate indoctrination, I hate people forcing invalid information into children's heads, it's immoral and an assault on people's ability to develop critical thinking skills.

I'll also point out that hating religion doesn't mean that I hate religious people(especially since my father is a baptist preacher), when I say "religion", I mean it as dogmatic ideology. Dogmatic thinking needs to go.

Anyway, Merry Christmas

sloanstar1000 : That was a well-put statement.  I give you all the credit in the world.  Nicely done!

Really all that it is is a moneymaking scam under the guise of religion. Real religion encourages people to be good through examples set by holy books or just fear of damnation. Sure, people can pervert the purpose of religion, which is to explore one's spirituality, and do terrible things, but that's not religion's purpose. Scientology is going against the purpose of religion and just sucking money out of the pockets of the gullible and using it to reach more gullible people and get more money. I mean, at least there's good reasons to follow Christianity, Judaism, Buddhism, and the like, but scientology offers no good reasons to get sucked up in it. Worse yet, leaders act very suspiciously and secretively. I'm an atheist, by the way, and even I can find advantages in any religion that's not like scientology. You can only go up from there.

I may not like the idea and it may have been a scam at one point, but people truly believe in it and respond to it. So I would say it is a religion. Not my religion, but someone's.

It was a religion invented by hollywood then thrown to the world to spread like a virus.  It's like some rich guys joke.

I am very happy to be too poor to be in their target group.

Scientology has been called the "rich man's religion" by some, and with good reason. You see, though money matters are no problem to any other religion I've ever heard of, it costs upwards of $300,000 to advance to the highest "level" of Scientology. Truthfully, that's a ridiculous amount to pay, especially if they aren't in it for the money. This cost has bankrupted many Scientologists who attempted to advance higher and higher until their bank accounts were completely dry and everything they owned was about to be taken away.

Speaking of abused Scientologists, there's been an astounding number of deaths pointing towards poor Scientologists who were unable to pay anything more to the Church. One woman was taken away from the scene of a car accident by Scientologists and taken to a motel, where she was forced to listen to Scientologist audio tapes being played. For multiple weeks, she was left there with neither food nor water. Directly before her death, she was to be taken to a hospital. Instead of taking her to one of the nearby hospitals that were almost within walking distance, Scientologists insisted on driving to a hospital over 20 miles away, just because said hospital had a Scientologist employed there. The nature of her death seems more than a little suspicious.

While there are people of different religions that react extremely poorly to criticism of their beliefs, Scientologists take this to a level nearly beyond comprehension. They are literally instructed that anyone who criticizes the Church is a "suppressive person" and that "anything goes" when it comes to dealing with them. It is no surprise that this has caused homicides by Scientologists in a vain attempt to, ironically, suppress other people's opinions and information. To their legal department, anything that isn't true about the Church or Scientology is "libel" or "slander," and anything that IS true is labeled as "copyright infringement." I wish I was joking about that last one.

To call Scientology a false religion or ridiculous is, in many cases, teapot calling kettle.
There is no religion devoid of ridiculous claims, to believe them then criticise someone else for believing something absurd is little better than snobbery or hypocrisy.
I think its one of the more ridiculous ones, and certainly made to bring wealth and power to those who founded it, but frankly thats my view on every other religion so my opposition to this religion is the same as any other.