The Age (Melbourne), 19 Dec 1980, p3

Scientology religion claim sham, says judge By PRUE INNESand AILEEN BERRY

The Scientology organisation's claims to be a religion were a sham, a
Supreme Court judge said yesterday. Some of its services were grotesque,
a mockery of religion, he said.Mr Justice Crockett made the comments in dismissing an appeal by the
organisation, calling itself the Church of the New Faith, against a
decision of the Commissioner of Payroll Tax not to grant it exemption
from the tax as a religious institution.

The Guardian of the Melbourne Church of Scientology, the Reverend Elaine
Allen, said there would be an immediate appeal against the judgment.
Mr Justice Crockett described some of the organisation's activities,
including "christening" services, as a "grotesque parody ofChristianity".

Some of its practices and professed beliefs were "no more than a mockery
of religion", and the fact that some gullible people accepted it as a
genuine religion did not make it so, he said.Mr Justice Crockett
said the only question to decide in the case was
whether Scientology was a religious institution. The organisation's
difficulty was that it had not always described itself as a religion. It
had done so in Australia only in recent years."An institution does not, of course, become a religion in character
simply because its members choose to call themselves, and the corporate
body by which they are organised, a church," he said. "Despite the
clerical connotation suggested by the title description ... the association's title
has a peculiarly secular ring about it."A further difficulty, he said, was that there were several unequivocal
rejections in the Scientology literature tendered in court of the notionthat Scientology was a religion.

The judge also said that by the 1960s there was concern in Victoria that
the organisation's practices might be harmful. A board of inquiry,
chaired by Mr Justice Anderson, was highly critical of the organisation,
found its practices were evil, and recommended legislation to control
it.As a result, the Psychological Practices Act was passed in 1965, to
register and supervise those who practiced psychoolgy, and to prohibit
the use of a device known as an E-meter or similar instrument. E-meters
were said to be able to detect emotional reaction.Mr Justice Crockett said:
"This section was clearly aimed specificallyat Scientologists.

The E-meter is an important, and seems the only, apparatus employed in
Scientology. It is an instrument designed to register electrical resistance.
"The Psychological Practices Act makes it an offence for anyone to hold
himself out as willing to teach Scientology, although an exemption is
provided for a priest or minister of a recognised religion defined as
authorised to celebrate marriages.Mr Justice Crockett said that the history of Scientology's treatment at
the hands of the Parliament of Victoria "render it scarcely likely that
the Governor-in-Council would proclaim Scientology as a recognised
religion."But, he said, the Commonwealth might have proved more
amenable if theorganisation was "metamorphosed so that a recognisable semblance of what
might be commonly thought to be the structure of a religious body was
achieved.

"The organisation thus adopted many ecclesiastical trappings and took on
many of the characteristics of a Christian denomination. At the same
time, Scientology's essentially secular philosophy was reinterpreted,
if not rewritten, into a philosophy which could be construed as religious
dogma. Sunday "worship" and similar traditional religious services were adopted.

The E-meter was now described as a religious artifact used in
the "church confessional".An American booklet describing ceremonies included procedures for
conducting services, weddings and christenings. "They are there
described in a somewhat grotesque parody of Christianity, with which
Scientology has little or nothing in common," Mr Justice Crockett said.
"The probability is that those so-called ceremonies were devised and
published as a device to enable with such attendant advantages as would
thereby accrue, Scientology to be paraded as a church in the United
States," he said."Presumably, the professed religious aims of the 'founding churches' in
the United States, as they are to be found in their respective articles,
are to be explained as no more than a cynical manipulation for advantage
of the laws relating to financial immunity granted to religious
organisations in that country."

He said that in a decade of reinterpretation of Scientology works and
the adoption of ceremonies and creed, there was an obvious attempt to
enhance the illusion that the organisation had become a religion.

The "ministers" wore garb indistinguishable from that of a Christian
priest or minister, and a symbol was adopted which bore a striking
resemblance to the crucifix.

Mr Justice Crockett said the Victorian legislation drove the organisation
underground, or into other States, and there was no better
method to avoid destruction than to simulate, and become accepted as, a
religion. "There can be no denying that the new image assiduously cultivated since
the enactment of the Victorian legislation ... has been singularly
successful," he said.Mr Justice Crockett said that the other three States
where Scientology was practices, New South Wales, South Australia and Western Australia,
and the Australian Capital Territory, had granted payroll tax exemption.

But he most favorable administrative decision was the ruling in
February1973 by the then Federal Attorney-General, Senator Murphy, that
Scientology was a "recognised denomination" under the Marriage Act.

This meant that Scientology's ministers were authorised to act as
marriage celebrants and the practice of Scientology had a virtual
immunity from the prohibitions of the Victorian Psychological PracticesAct.

He said these were administrative rulings which gave little assistance
to the organisation in this case.Mr Justice Crockett said had he seen only the organisation's
publications since 1970, he might agree that the institution was
religious in character if he accepted its principles, beliefs and practices as genuine.

"However, I am persuaded ... Scientology is not, subject to one
reservation, a religious institution because it is, in relation to its
religious pretensions, no more than a sham," he said.

Its bogus claims to believe in prayer and other aspects of a creed based
on a divine being, were "no more than a mockery of religion. Scientology
was not practised is in reality the antithesis of a religion".

Mr Justice Crockett said the adroitness with which it had so cynically
adopted itself served only to rob the movement of the sincerity and
integrity that must be cardinal features of any religious faith.

The only qualification was whether Scientology, as evolved by its
founder L. Ron Hubbard, and practised in its "pure" form until 1965,
ought to be regarded as a religious institution.

"It is not for me, of course, to pass any judgment on the correctness or otherwise of the
doctrines of Scientology," the judge said. But it seemed to be more
concerned with its doctrines relating to the soul or spirit, the self,
than with any concept of a divine being."The aims, objects and purposes
of Scientology were, I think, accurately
summed up by its principal spokesman before the Victorian board of inquiry
when he described them as being "to increase the efficiency and
well-being of the individual person ... to increase the efficiency and
well-being of society as a whole".

The judge said this could in no sense be regarded as a religion, and at
that time, Scientology did not wish to be regarded as such, making
express claims that it was non-religious.

Mr Justice Crockett said there were five or six thousand members of the
organisation in Victoria. He said the Commissioner of Corporate Affairs
had refused to allow the organisation to register itself as the Church
of Scientology Incorporated, although it used that name in three other
States.Mrs Allen, the organisation's Melbourne Guardian, said the Supreme Court
case had cost the Church of Scientology $10,000 or $12,000 so far. "I
must say I am horrified at the cost of justice, but we will spend as
many thousands again, if we need to, to win," she said."There are many ways up the mountain
side and we will find the right one."Scientology was founded by L. Ron Hubbard,
and teaches his views. Its firts so-called church was set up in California in 1954.