Fundamental differences between Scientology and Christianity?

Question

I'm not really familiar with scientology, but as far as I can tell fundamentally they're both religions that are based on a book, (admitedly the bible's a little under 2000 years old, but still just a book). That consits of, what any reasonable person would read as fiction (i.e. talking snakes, global floods, people turning into salt pillars, and scientology has something to dowith aliens?, etc....).

So really is the base of each religion that much different? In 2000 years will we all be walking around worshipping aliens,and wearing tin-foil hats?

p.s.
If someone could summarize scientology into a paragraph (or better yet a sentence or bullet point) for me I'd appreciate it. I'm too lazy to look it up for myself. :p

Answer 1

This is what Scientologists ACTUALLY believe:

Xenu was an alien ruler of the "Galactic Confederacy" who, 75 million years ago, brought billions of people to Earth in spacecrafts resembling Douglas DC-8 airliners, stacked them around volcanoes and blew them up with hydrogen bombs. Their souls then clustered together and stuck to the bodies of the living. The alien souls continue to do this today, causing a variety of physical ill-effects in modern-day humans. L. Ron Hubbard (a science-fiction writer and the creator of Scientology) called these clustered spirits "Body Thetans," and the advanced levels in Scientology place considerable emphasis on isolating them and neutralizing their ill effects.

To rid ourselves of "Body Thetans", we have to go through "auditing" with a member of the “church” who uses an "e-meter" to measure our “reactive mind” in order to clear our mind of “engrams” (past negative experiences stored in our unconscious mind) so that we can become “clear”...... and we have to pay lots and lots and lots of money to take courses on Scientology to advance to higher “levels” in the “church”. The “church” has also taken a very hostile stance towards psychiatry and psychiatric drugs irrespective of the fact that some people require medication to remain adequately functional in everyday life and has been known to withhold prescription pharmaceuticals from member (with deadly results).

Scientology is undeniably a cult.

Every cult can be defined as a group having all of the following five characteristics:

1. It uses psychological coercion to recruit, indoctrinate and retain its members
2. It forms an elitist totalitarian society.
3. Its founder leader is self-appointed, dogmatic, messianic, not accountable and has charisma.
4. It believes 'the end justifies the means' in order to solicit funds & recruit people.
5. Its wealth does not benefit its members or society.

Are Cults Harmful?

To remain within the strict mental and social confines of a cult for even a short time can have the following disastrous effects:

Loss of choice and free will. Diminished intellectual ability, vocabulary and sense of humor. Reduced use of irony, abstractions and metaphors. Reduced capacity to form flexible and intimate relationships. Poor judgment. Physical deterioration. Malnutrition. Hallucinations, panic, dissociation, guilt, identity diffusion and paranoia. Neurotic, psychotic or suicidal tendencies.

Answer 2

OK WHOA WHOA WHOA HOLD THE PHONE! Person above me PALEASE........... DO NOT COMPARE SCIENTOLOGY TO BUDDHISM. They are two different religions. In fact, I wouldn't even consider scientology a religion because it is all based on someone’s opinions of his own realization and self-proclamation through a belief system that is basically the saying "mind over matter". Buddhism is not a teaching; it's a way of life. Yes it involves chanting (for meditation purposes), karma, self realization through the practice, the belief that there is reincarnation and past lives we've lived as a spirit, but it does not at all put down or slander anything that does not follow the religion. By this I mean, Buddhists do not believe it is right to live life according to someone else, it is strictly for inner peace. You cannot change what you have done in the past, and nowhere has the Buddhist religion said that you can be freed, it's simply based on the belief that you can change your own life by changing your causes/actions.

Dianetics is BS. How can you get rid of the reactive mind? That's like saying that they are taking a piece of your brain out of you so you can forget about the bad, stupid, ugly things you've done. Why would you want to forget when, where, and how you did something wrong if you learn something from it? i.e. learned a lesson, learned right from wrong because of the effect of your cause that you yourself made? Basically L. Ron Hubbard is saying you can simply forget about all the bad things you did and start fresh, and make the same mistakes over and over again because your religion tells you that you are freed if you stick to the "Step by Step" process of cleansing yourself of your "engrams".

And isn’t "auditing" the very thing psychology is? I mean, when you go see a psychologist or therapist regarding your problems, you talk about them right? This guy is a freakin Science Fiction Author for god sakes, not a spiritual leader. I'm sure he has the right idea, and YAY for him that he reached his own potential by following his own step by step process, but the fact of the matter is, there is only one person that can change they're actions. AND GUESS WHAT? They have to knowingly and willingly do so by making a good cause and getting a good effect in return. What you put out is what you get back, plain and simple. You don't need some Bunk religion to make you feel better about yourself. Just change your actions and stop being stupid. Stop blaming your problems on your unconscious thoughts, that's a freakin joke!

And don’t even get me started on Tom Cruise. He is the worst thing that could have happened to himself. Talk about being so blinded by his own teachings that he completely makes a fool of himself, a perfect example of my point. When he went on Good Morning America and slandered Brooke Shields for taking a prescription for her Post Partum Depression… What happened? Everyone gave him crap for doing it, and lets be honest. It was freakin RUDE. How dare he blast someone else’s problems on national television to glorify his religion and belief system? If his damn religion is so great, then why did L Ron Hubbard’s wife try to steel documents that could be damaging to the religion from the US Government? Why were all or most of the highest Scientologists of the church sent to jail for infiltration of the IRS?

I believe, in my heart, that SCIENTOLOGY IS A JOKE. Yes all that stuff that psychologists did in the past was really bad. Don’t make a religion about it, it’s our history, and we aren’t proud of it. There will never be a world without crazy, mean, horrible, murderous, psychotic, emotionally unbalanced people, and miss Mary Sue Hubbard and her affiliates who were part of the “Snow White Project” are a perfect example of that. The belief systems of the scientology church are basically to relieve these symptoms and make the world a better place, one person at a time. Thank god (or whoever it is that put us on this great earth), that we were given free will. Could you imagine if we were forced to believe this crap?

Answer 3

The only real difference is that one is close to 2000 years old and one is about 50 years old. Their primary purpose is to make money for a few select people. L Ron Hubbard said it to some of his science fiction author contemporaries. If you want to make real money start a religion and he did.

Answer 4

Christianity & Scientology Are all Fake religion's as well every religion out there is fake. The bible is not true, it has been rewritten so many times that there is no truth to it.
Faith does not exsist, nore do we it is all a nightmare. The world only exsists because you won't wake up, so wake up already.
Athiests are a figiment of your imaginations, nothing exsists.

Answer 5

Parts of the Old Testament are 4,000 years old, not 2,000. Christianity doesn't involve aliens, Scientology does.

Answer 6

First I want to clarify that the story of Xeno is just a fable and no Scientologist believe it to be true. In fact most Scientologist I have meet haven't even heard the story. Scientology isn't a faith system but a series of proceses that a person uses to find his own truth.Scientology is much like Buddhism but instead of meditation they use auditing with the same goal and faster results. Here are some of the principles.

1. What is true for you is what you your self observe to be true.
This is a common believe with Buddhism in the Kalama Sutta, the Buddha teaches the danger in fashioning one's beliefs merely on the following grounds: on hearsay, on tradition, because many others say it is so, on the authority of ancient scriptures, on the word of a supernatural being, or out of trust in one's teachers, elders, or priests. Instead one maintains an open mind and thoroughly investigates one's own experience of life.

2. Man is his spirit not his mind or his body. This is a common believe with many religions.

3. The spirit creates his own mind. Please do not confuse the mind with the brain that is a physical thing. The mind is composed of mental image pictures as explained in Dianetics. These pictures serve the spirit to give him knowlege and experiance. These pictures are composed of energy. The energy in the picture can affect the spirit. You can feel better by remembering something that you like or angry by remembering something else. These emotions are actually energy waves emanated by the picture. You can actually feel pain by remembering a pain memory. Sometimes this pictures are acompanied by ideas or considerations. Lets suposed that you father beat you mom up in front of you. Your father was the dominating figure so you might conclude that you have to act like your father in some situacions. This is what we call in Scientology an aberation (a conclusion that is impose to you by a mental picture). This picture is what we call a engram; A pain memory that affects your judgement and free will.

4. A spirit is capable of considerations and ideas and this ideas are solely based on uglyness and beautyfullness. The spirit reject ugly things and intends on making everything beautyfull. Do you like your car, you house, your job, your friends? Are you friends nice with you? Can you improve things in your life? All these are ideas based on uglyness and beautyfullness. This is why the spirits rejects the ugly memories and by rejecting the ugly memories (not confronting them) he is unknowingly affected by them.

5. You can discharge the energy in this pictures true communication. This is Auditing, the Auditor directs your attention to this pictures regardless of how ugly they are and you confront the picture and discharge the energy of the picture true the communication line. Is like if you have battery, in order to discharge the battery you need to discharged against something. If you try to discharge it against your self is just going to chock you.

Scientology is a very interesting religion that takes years of study to master. I just mentioned a few fundamentals. Scientology is so advance and so different that people can't understand it. People think that they know everything there is to know about life. And when they see Scientology they jump to conclusions when in reality they don't have a clue what are they talking about. The reality is that man attacks what he can't understand. That's why Scientology gets so much bad press. Scientologist see all these bad press with pity. They understand that people are acting out of ignorance and using their reactive mind. Is like watching a bunch of cows in a stampede going towards a Cliff. They are going in that direction because the cow in front is going that way, What they don't know is that the cow in front is blind. Scientologist are the few blessed ones that can see the truth and get out of the stampede.

Answer 7

Christianity has truth to it, more than likely scientology doesnt.


James 1:3-Knowing this, that the trying of your faith worketh patience.

Answer 8

ALL religion is a hinderance to the one and only thing that matters, your relationship with Jesus. To sum up scientology, It ain't Jesus so it don't matter.

Answer 9

Yes bible tells us that World is round and about dinosaurs in Job .. it also tells that fever and illness is because of meat after the fall and it also tells that fat is harmfull..and many more things!! it have been told 2006 years ago..

Answer 10

The difference is that scientology is a cult of greed and christianty is an even bigger cult of greed.