Sixty years ago, a man named Lafayette Ronald Hubbard founded a religion that, to this day, has sparked much controversy. With 500,000 members in 8,000 churches in 164 countries, the Church has grown slowly but surely since its formation. (Scientology.) The religion is based on a novel by Hubbard called Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health. They believe that about 75 million years ago, an evil alien warlord named Xenu banished 13.5 trillion aliens to Earth and that the souls of these aliens have clung to humans ever since. (Rowley) Although this may sound rather ridiculous, there are a decent number of people who are members of the church and wholeheartedly believe every word that is said to them. According to Hubbard, an energy within his own "spiritual universe", called Theta, created the physical universe. It states that souls, called thetans, are all part of the spiritual universe. These thetans inhabit human bodies and when their human body dies, they simply move on to another. Hubbard states that an engram is a bad thought or feeling and that past life engrams are the cause of physical and mental illnesses in current lives. The only way to eliminate these engrams, according to this ridiculous theory, is to go through a series of "tests" called auditing. The more auditions a Scientologist goes through, the higher level they can reach. When he reaches the level of "Operating Thetan", he is believed to be able to send his thetan out of his physical body to control matter, energy, space, time, thought and life . (The Beliefs and Teachings of Scientology) The ultimate goal of Scientology is called "The Bridge to Total Freedom." ...... middle of paper ...... job, which would respond to telephone complaints about cults for one reason or another and Scientology has received more complaints than any other organization. As suspicious as it may seem, Scientology later bought the network and now runs it. Coincidentally, there are no more complaints related to Scientology. (Behar) As Michael Shermer said: “In my opinion, if Scientology is not a cult, then nothing is a cult and the word has no meaning. » (Is Scientology a cult?) After seeing countless evidence piling up against this so-called “church,” it still has many unhappy followers. The deceptive nature of Scientology is a problem for society and must end as soon as possible. They are simply a dangerous, greedy, illogical cult that only wants more money and doesn't care who they have to hurt to get it. Scientology must be stopped.