In the UK, Scientology isn’t recognised as a religion. I see no reason why it shouldn’t be recognised as a religion, as it certainly has many things in common with other faiths: it has a theology, its followers believe that humanity needs salvation, people get indoctrinated at an early age, believers get spiritual counselling, and its organisation is a complex hierarchy in which its members progress through various ’levels'.

Scientology regularly gets a deserved drubbing by the media, the BBC Panorama programme “Scientology and Me” being a recent example. But why should it be singled out from other religions to get this amount of criticism? Why is the story of Xenu any more ridiculous than the story of Noah’s genocide, God creating the earth and everything on it in six days, Mary’s virgin birth, or Jesus’ resurrection? To refer to the theme of Dan Dennett’s presentation at TED, they are all dangerous ideas and should be treated with absolutely no respect.

So to those about to write another piece claiming the Scientology is 100% Bullshit, remember there are plenty of other religions equally deserving of such criticism.