Up: Martin Poulter > Scientology Criticism > UK Media Archive
From chriso@lutefisk.demon.co.uk Sun Jan 31 12:41:30 GMT 1999 THE SCOTSMAN, 7 November 1997 ---------- German high court balks at ruling on Scientology BY DENIS STAUNTON GERMANY'S supreme administrative court refused yesterday to rule on whether the Church of Scientology should be treated as a bona fide religion and ordered a lower court to decide if the group is a non- profit organisation or a commercial enterprise. The court was asked to rule on a decision by the southern state of Baden-Wuerttemberg to deny charitable status to the local Scientology branch, on the basis that the sect was a money-making venture rather than a religion. The judges in Berlin instructed Baden-Wuerttemberg's administrative court to rule on the issue, but suggested that the group should only be considered a business if it made a profit from selling educational materials to non-members. German Scientologists insist they make no profit from the materials and that they should be treated in the same way as any other religious denomination. Scientology enjoys charitable status in all of Germany's 16 federal states, but a ruling against the sect would undoubtedly encourage state governments to take action against the group. Interior ministers from the federal states agreed earlier this year to order the intelligence services to investigate Scientologists, who German officials accuse of being totalitarian and anti-democratic. Scientologists such as the actor Tom Cruise and the musician Chick Corea have been targeted for boycotts in Baden-Wuerttemberg, and the state of Bavaria last year banned members of the sect from joining the civil service. The organisation took out full-page advertisements in a number of European newspapers earlier this year to condemn Germany's treatment of Scientologists, comparing it with Hitler's persecution of the Jews. The organisation has more than 10 million members in 74 countries, including about 30,000 in Germany, where it made an estimated 60 million from books and educational courses last year. The Confederation of German Industry and Commerce describes Scientology claims that the organisation uses conventional businesses, especially estate agents, as front groups, demanding that up to 18 per cent of the profits be paid to its central fund. "Because of the immense pressure to succeed, the firm is practically forced to swindle its customers," according to a report by the confederation's Cologne branch. At least 20 firms linked to Scientology have been set up in Berlin since reunification to capitalise on the property boom following the fall of the Wall. Rival estate agents claim that Scientologists exert pressure on tenants to buy their flats outright or to move out. Founded in 1954 by the science fiction writer L Ronald Hubbard, the Church of Scientology teaches a bizarre belief system called Dianetics, which combines elements of Buddhism, Christianity and Freudianism with a dash of astral history. The interior minister of Baden-Wuerttemberg, which has kept Scientologists under surveillance since the beginning of this year. The ministry claims that the sect is determined to place its members in influential positions in Germany's business and political worlds. Few Germans show any sympathy towards Scientology, but some liberal observers argue that the government's approach is counter-productive. Diplomats acknowledge that the issue has become an unwelcome irritation in the relationship of Germany with the United States. The US state department has complained about Germany's treatment of Scientologists, and the United Nations Human Rights Commission has censured the state of Baden-Wuerttemberg for its attitude to the sect.
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