Scientology Couple Who Won Supreme Court Challenge Get Married in London

Louisa Hodkin and Alessandro Calcioli got married at the
Scientology chapel in London

BBC: A couple who won a Supreme Court challenge have got married in a Church of Scientology chapel in London.

Louisa Hodkin started the legal action after officials refused to register the Church of Scientology chapel as a place for marriage for her and fiance Alessandro Calcioli.

In December, five Supreme Court judges ruled the church was a "place of meeting for religious worship".

After the wedding, Mr Calcioli said he was "ecstatic" about the occasion.

He added he was "a little bit speechless but just so, so happy that this day has finally come". » | Sunday, February 23, 2014

Scientology Is a Religion, Rules Supreme Court

THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: A woman who wants to marry in a Church of Scientology chapel has won a battle in the UK's highest court

Scientology is a religion, the UK's highest court has ruled, after a woman won a battle to marry in a Church of Scientology chapel.

Scientologist Louisa Hodkin took her fight to the Supreme Court after a High Court judge ruled last year that services run by Scientologists were not "acts of worship".

But five Supreme Court justices ruled in her favour on Wednesday, announcing that the Scientology church was a "place of meeting for religious worship". » | Alice Philipson and agencies | Wednesday, December 11, 2013

Scheidung von Scientology?: Das jähe Ende von TomKat
Katies Flucht besiegelte das spektakuläre Ende von TomKat: der Ehe von Superstar und Super-Scientologen Tom Cruise und der 17 Jahre jüngeren einstigen Seriendarstellerin Katie Holmes. Eine anfangs perfekt inszenierte Lovestory auf den roten Teppichen der Welt ist Geschichte. Welche Rolle spielte die Sorge um Tochter Suri? Sektenaussteiger schildern ihre Erlebnisse.
Das Video hier abspielen | Montag, 09. Juli 2012
Related »

Church of Scientology Launching TV Station
THE DAILY TELEGRAPH: The Church of Scientology, the religion whose followers include actors Tom Cruise and John Travolta, plans to start a religious broadcasting centre to promote its teachings over TV, radio and the internet.

The centre, located near the church's West Coast headquarters in Hollywood, would occupy the nearly five-acre studio property the church bought last year from Los Angeles public TV station KCET for $42 million (£27 million).

The station would elevate the public profile of a religion that has mostly relied on pamphlets and books by its founder, L. Ron Hubbard, to proselytise for new members.

"The church plans to establish a central media hub for our growing world network of churches and to move into the production of religious television and radio broadcasting," said Karin Pouw, a spokeswoman for Church of Scientology International, in an email.

She said there is no timetable for when operations would begin. » | Thursday, July 12, 2012

Scientology Arrest Makes a Mockery of the Law
Photo courtesy of The Telegraph
THE TELEGRAPH: The teenage boy facing prosecution for holding a placard saying that scientology is a "cult" serves to demonstrate the ridiculous mess that the Government has made of its attempts to protect religious observance in law.

This nameless boy has been served with a summons under section five of the Public Order Act, which seeks to restrict signs that might be considered "threatening, abusive or insulting." Meanwhile, we have a Racial and Religious Hatred Act, which passed into law in 2006 with the express purpose of making it an offence to incite hatred on religious grounds.

By co-incidence, it was in 2006 that militant Muslims demonstrated at the Danish Embassy in London over the publication in Denmark of cartoons depicting the Prophet Mohammed. Their placards variously read

"Slay/Annihilate/Butcher/Massacre/Behead…those who insult Islam." I am unaware of any charges that were brought against the bearers of these placards under either the Public Order Act or, more pertinently, the Racial and Religious Hatred Act. That's because the provisions of the legislation are almost meaningless in action.

But if the law is an ass, those who enforce it are whipped mules. The police in these circumstances are too inclined to side with the bullies. The violent Islamists outside the Danish Embassy were protected; far easier to feel the collar of a teenage boy with a harmless slogan. The bullies in the latter incident are those who worship their own lifestyle at the Church of Scientology.

Theirs is not the brutish violence of the Islamists. The Scientologists mess with people's minds. That's why the BBC's John Sweeney memorably lost it on air, while shooting a documentary on them. The pity is that they now seem to have warped the minds of the City of London Police. [Source: Scientology Arrest Makes a Mockery of the Law] By George Pitcher | May 21, 2008

STEVEN ALAN HASSAN:
Freedom of Mind Center

The Dawning of a New Dark Age (Paperback - UK)
The Dawning of a New Dark Age (Hardback - UK)

Tom Cruise Talking Nonsense: Tom Cruise Talking about Scientology
A drunken man wouldn’t talk more nonsense than this!

Tom Cruise, the Goebbels of Scientology?

Mark Alexander (Paperback)
Mark Alexander (Hardback)

Scientology: “Business, Cult, or Religion?”
Image courtesy of Google Images
SPIEGELONLINE INTERNATIONAL: German suspicion of Scientology resurfaced in Hamburg this week after a security official said he would seek a nationwide ban against the organization. He's arguing that Scientology is an "unconstitutional" big business.

Germany and Scientology have never been the best of friends. German officials consider Scientology a business, not a religion, and tax the outfit accordingly. Scientology has responded by complaining about "religious discrimination." Yet Berlin has a Scientology center, and the famous Scientologist Tom Cruise came to Berlin this year to film a big-budget Hollywood film -- even, after some debate, in restricted Nazi-era buildings.

Now an official in Hamburg named Udo Nagel is pursuing a national ban against the US-based organization.

As the city-state's interior minister, Nagel is Hamburg's top security official. At a meeting this week of other interior ministers from other states around Germany he plans to argue that Scientology is not only a commercial enterprise but also an "anti-constitutional" group with "aggressively fierce" tactics. Hamburg Official Wants a Germany-Wide Ban on Scientology >>>

Mark Alexander

German Defence Ministry Refuses Cruise Permission to Play Count Stauffenberg
SPIEGELONLINE INTERNATIONAL: The German Defense Ministry has said it will not permit Tom Cruise to film scenes in a movie about a plot to kill Hitler at historical World War II sites in Berlin. The reason: Politicians don't want Germany to be seen as promoting the Scientology cult.

Germany's Defense Ministry has said it will ban the Hollywood makers of a film about a plot to kill Hitler from shooting scenes at military sites in Berlin because its heartthrob star, Tom Cruise, is a Scientologist. Filming is expected to start in July on "Valkyrie," a drama about a failed plot hatched by Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg to kill Hitler using a briefcase bomb.

Defense Ministry spokesman Harald Kammerbauer, cited by Reuters, said the fimmakers "will not be allowed to film at German military sites if Count Stauffenberg is played by Tom Cruise, who has publicly professed to being a member of the Scientology cult." Berlin Politicians Attack Cruise, Scientology (more)

Mark Alexander

Scientologen versuchen Ethik und Religionsunterricht in deutschen Schulen einzuprägen

Photo courtesy of Google Images

WELT ONLINE: Scientologen versuchen Einfluss auf den Ethik- und Religionsunterricht an deutschen Schulen zu nehmen. Im gesamten Bundesgebiet verschicken Mitglieder zweifelhafte Informationsmaterialien an Schulleitungen. Davor warnt jetzt der Deutsche Philologenverband. Scientologen drängen in die Schulen (mehr)

Mark Alexander

The BBC Shows Its Unprofessional Side
The BBC has spent six months investigating whether or not Scientology is a legitimate religion. Not really a very wise use of limited resources for the BBC, since Scientology, whatever one thinks of it, is no threat to the survival of the West. It would have been far better for the BBC to have spent its money and time investigating the ‘religion’ of Islam. But since they didn’t, and since they have completed their hatchet job on Scientology, perhaps they could now turn their attentions to investigating whether Islam is a legitimate religion, too. And while they’re at it, they can do a cost-benefit study on allowing Muslims into the West in their droves, when so many of them have no intention of ever integrating (integration goes against their faith), and when so many of them want to Islamize every corner of the earth, including the United Kingdom. In a few words, Muslims want to turn the House of War (Dar ul Harb) into the House of Islam (Dar ul Islam). That means to say that they want to turn the whole world Muslim! – ©Mark Alexander

TIMESONLINE: Scientologists to BBC: what planet are you living on?

BBC reporter losing it!

Click here to watch: BBC Panorama: “Scientology and me”

BBC: Row over Scientology video

THE TELEGRAPH: BBC reporter blows his top at Scientologist

Mark Alexander