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On the edge

The Big Issue, 3 March 1997
On the edge: C J Stone

I was listening to L Ron Hubbard on tape with a friend of mine (Hubbard
being the science fiction writer who founded the Church of Scientology -
now home to Hollywood stars such as John Travolta and Tom Cruise). My
friend is an ex-member. He was guffawing all the way through. "I used to
take this so seriously," he said.
	The basic theory of the Church is that we are all re-incarnations
of extra-terrestrial beings called Thetans. Members of the Church pay vast
amounts to rise through the ranks starting from OT1. OT stands for
Operating Thetan.
	The tape was made sometime in the early Sixties. Ron was telling
us about a near-death brush with some vast Truth. He referred to it as the
Wall of Fire. So awe-inspiring, so terrible is it that the mere mention of
it would make you sick.
	Many people who have approached this Truth have died. Ron is the
first to have come through that ordeal. He did it so that others would be
able to follow. This Truth is only accessible to OT3s. To reach OT3 costs
many thousands.
	My friend told me what this 'truth' actually is. It concerns the
origins of sexual perversion. Apparently a Thetan dictator called Xemu
brought certain of his subjects to Earth several billion years ago, where
he tied them to a mountain and dropped nuclear bombs on them. He was
experimenting on them, by implanting them with sexual perversion.
	My friend had it sussed. "So Ron was right. It would make you
sick," he said. "It would make you sick to have paid all that money just
to hear such a load of old codswallop."
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