The Pageless Book

Photo Above by Jarnocan. Photo Below by Ralph Hockens. Last Photo by Tracy Olson.

Yesterday I wrote about the questionable policies of the Church of Scientology, in my attempt to show why I applaud Anonymous in opposing the Church of Scientology. Today, I am interesting in talking about some of the more specific acts of this organization - in particular, illegal acts. However, I find myself at a loss. When I went to research for this article, I found that I could barely scratch the surface in the 500 - 700 words I normally write. As such, I’ve decided to only detail a few of the more grievous offenses this so-called Church.

Operation Snow White is the code-name of the Scientology project to infiltrate government agencies (both U.S. and Foreign) and destroy undesirable documents related to the Church of Scientology and its founder, Ron L. Hubbard. The FBI uncovered the operation as apart of a raid on Scientology property in 1977. The documents included plans to not only steal and destroy documents, but to plant false documents, and wiretaps on the IRS. This led to the conviction of eleven of the top ranking members of the Church, including Ronnie’s wife, Mary Sue Hubbard. You can read more about Operation Snow White here.

During the same raid, the FBI uncovered another project, Operation Freak Out, which targeted the journalist and author Paulette Cooper. In the early 1970’s she had written a book on the church which was considered libel by the church. The purpose of Operation Freak Out was to incriminate Paulette Cooper in anyway possible to destroy her credibility. This first began with escalating sexual harassment including subscribing her to pornographic magazines, obscene phone calls, and letters to her neighbors with various unsavory claims about her sex life. Then they forged bomb threats on stationary they had stole from her home and mailed it to the New York Church of Scientology in such a way to make it seem like she sent them. The final phase of Operation Freak Out conspired to frame Paulette Cooper with the Federal crime of making threats on the life of the President of the United States. You can read more about Operation Freak Out here.

Thankfully, the Church of Scientology was raided before they could put this plan into action. However, what I want to point out about this is the timing; these acts of harassment all occurred after the Fair Game policy was supposedly discontinued. All evidence suggests that the Fair Game policy is still in effect. What evidence? The evidence found on Xenu.net - claims of harassment, assault, false imprisonment, extortion, and invasion of privacy backed up by court documents. These are only the people who have come forward.

Now, to be fair, these are individuals who are outside the Church. We should judge the Church of Scientology by the good it does for its members, employees, and their children. You should keep this in mind, while reading the following stories:

Adeline Dodd-Bova describes her time as a teacher in Scientology schools and writes of troubling cases of insufficient sleep and children having little or no food. Even more disturbing is her description of children whose sexual and physical abuse were not reported to Social Services.

Mary Tabayoyon’s sworn affidavit describes several instances of women coerced into having abortions under threat of severe punishment. Note that Scientology considers abortion to be a serious sin, so these women were also being coerced into committing a grave violation of their religious beliefs.

Stacy Young’s sworn declaration states that RPF (Rehabilitation Project Force) “slave labor” is used to build luxury facilities for Scientology celebrities and are paid $5 a week for 70-hour weeks.

Lisa McPherson died in the custody of Scientology in Clearwater, FL. She was treated by a Scientology doctor who was not licensed to practice in Florida. In addition, it appears that Scientology had put Lisa on the Introspection Rundown. Her family is suing Scientology for wrongful death.

The Church charge its members hundreds of thousands of dollars to be treated in this manner. Worse yet, because they have declared themselves a religion, they are not required to pay taxes. The organization known as the Church of Scientology is, in my opinion, the most corrupt cooperate enterprises in the English speaking world today. This is why Scientology deserves to be protested against. A cry for justice must not be misconstrued for religious intolerance.

Above Photo by Joka2000. Photo Below by Alan Turkus. Final Photo by Joel Friesen.

Of Sandalphon, the second part of The Gated Emptiness, changes in tone and language from the rest of the text. The perspective shifts from third person to first person; little doubt is left as to whom is speaking. God speaks to us directly in these passages in a strangely humble demeanor.

I must remind the reader that this is filtered through my own consciousness. While I have perceived God speaking in a humble manner, it might be a result of my own discontent with the demanding God of the Jewish, Christian, and Islamic traditions. This means nothing as to the true personality of God; it is my understanding that our concept of personality is meaningless when compared against true divine consciousness. The text reads:

I am confusion. I am confused as you are. I am you.

Now, these three statements pose a significant problem - God isn’t suppose to be confused. Isn’t the Divine suppose to have some plan? Theologically, this can be pretty disturbing. However, there is more here than what is on the surface. The word “confusion” comes from the Latin word “confundere” which means to pour together. In the word’s evolution, it has also passed through old French as meaning “to overthrow”, before coming to the English language as meaning “mental perplexity or disturbance”.

All three of these definition play a part in understanding the meaning of this text. First, we are told that God embodies confusion. We are confused as to the nature of God, as it is beyond our ability to comprehend. What does it mean, however, to say that God is the embodiment of overthrowing? This becomes more clear with the second statement; saying that God is “overthrown” implies that God changes. Like we do, God evolves and learns through alternating between confusion and realization.

Yet this leads us to another question - why does God need to evolve or learn? With the third and final statement in conjunction with our third definition, this answer is laid to bare; we are apart of God. Just as we are several things “poured together” into human form - muscles, organs, cells, proteins, and atoms - God is also the admixture of several things; the only difference is that God’s “things” encompasses all. The text continues:

You will not be rid of me. You might shred off the fat and skin of your body, skewer your flesh with your own bone and I will be in pain with you. If you should love yourself, I would love you.

Well, if God is inherent in all things, and all things in God, it makes sense that we could not get rid of God. When we suffer God would suffer, just as when we cut our finger, we feel the pain with our finger. Should we choose to love ourselves, God would love us in return as we are apart of God. Only when we become hateful does the Divine become hateful towards us, just as we would hate cells that turn cancerous within our own body. Yet God is not done speaking about his love for us; the text continues:

Innumerous are the ways in which I love you. I love you with death and I love you with life. I love you with pain and with ecstasy. I love you with the blue empty sky and the full brown earth. I shall not save you from my love; I made you to see, and you shall see it all.

Death and life, pain and pleasure, all that is above and all that is below - all of our individual experiences are manifestations of God’s love for us. Our purpose in life is to find meaning within those experiences, to learn, and to evolve. We cannot be asked to be spared heartache, pain, and suffering; we would be in affect asking to remain unchanged, uninspired, and ignorant. Worse yet, we would be asking God to remain unchanging, uninspired, and support us like some parents support basement dwelling men and women in their early twenties.

I suspect that some would disagree with what I have written here, considering that my interpretation of this text amounts to answers for long-held insurmountable questions. To think that a few sentences are enough to answer the question “what is the meaning of life” or “why does God make us suffer” would be foolish on my part. However, I dare to suggest that what I am getting at is a fairly good guide towards answers for those questions. Like a finger pointing to the moon, it is important not to misinterpret that which points to the truth for the truth.

Welcome to the return of the Friday Vibes column on The Pageless Book. I’m not going to promise that we’ll have this column on a weekly basis, but I am going to try valiantly to see if it can be done. There are two pieces of news that I’d like to touch base on this Friday - some religion and some pop culture. It’s a nice mix, as always…

First, I want to talk about Moses and his alleged drug problem. Benny Shanon, an Israeli scholar, recently put forth the theory that the experiences of Moses on Mount Sinai were caused by the hallucinogenic drug, ayahuasca. SoMA Review has an article about this issue, proposing that Shanon’s proposal might be a little too speculative to be given any serious consideration. However, I would contend that Professor Shanon may be on to something.

All religions have their genesis in shamanism - the most primitive form of religion. Every shamanic culture has used extreme methods of altering consciousness, including the use of hallucinogenic drugs. It isn’t too much of a stretch to believe that Moses may have been what we would consider a shaman for the tribes of Israel. In which case the question becomes of which means of altering consciousness did Moses use? Ayahusca is as likely a suspect as fasting, sensory deprivation, sleep deprivation, and oxygen deprivation.

We have this idea that spiritual experiences that are purposely sought after are some how less important or real that those experiences that occur naturally. I can’t disagree more. The means in which Moses experienced God is little more than a historical note. So long as you find the message meaningful to your own life, how a religion came upon its message is unimportant. What is important is to remain open minded and honest with ourselves so that meaning does not become dogma.

In other news, the father of roleplaying games passed away this week at the age of 69. Gary Gygax, along with Dave Arneson, developed Dungeons & Dragons. This game inspired legions of awkward teenage boys to gather weekly around the gaming table… myself included. Even now, Dungeons & Dragons remains my favorite hobby. I strongly suggest heading over to The Wild Hunt to read Jason Pitzl-Waters’ tribute.

As for myself, I don’t have much to say, except that I am grateful for Gary Gygax’s contribution to gaming. If it was not for Dungeons & Dragons, I would not be half the writer I am today. So in honor of the original Dungeon Master, I present the following video:

Above Photo by Chris Brown.

Above Photo by Marcin Wichary. Photo Below by CBS Fan.

Recently, I had found this blog “90 Day Jane,” about a young woman who claimed that she would kill herself in 90 days. She wasn’t deathly ill or depressed - she was claiming to do this because life has no intrinsic meaning. She also claimed to be an atheist. Don’t bother to look for her blog, however… the whole thing was a hoax (excuse me, I meant “art project”) from the start and has been taken down. You can read more about it here.

There’s a lists of reasons longer than my arm as to why I’m disturbed by this recent non-event. First of all, there is the blatant abuse of suicide threats as means of entertainment. Having been suicidal before in my own life, I cannot begin to express how angry this makes me feel. There is also the matter of reinforcing the association between atheism and nihilism. While it may be true that most nihilists are also atheists, the reverse is not true. What most puzzles me, though, is that this even occurred to someone as being a good idea. Chuck Palahniuk and Hunter S. Thompson couldn’t ask for a better example of nihilism.

Why do I think that? Lets pretend for a moment that 90 Day Jane was really going to off herself in grand fashion on her own blog. She claims that her reason for doing this is to demonstrate the meaninglessness of existence. By advertising and making this public, she ironically gives meaning to her own existence - to serve as an example of nihilism. If someone can make their own meaning, that very act proves nihilism to be false. However, if this act becomes a mockery of itself it would serve only as twisted proof (however delusional) of the meaninglessness of existence. This is soundly accomplished through Jane’s half-hearted confession. This ordeal has all the offensiveness of a Nine Inch Nails video but none of the creativity.

It could be argued that I’m over reacting, and I very well may be. But I ask you, what else can you think of that is more of an affront to the principles of Unitarian Universalism? While I am tolerant and open minded, nihilism is not a philosophy that I can accept as being viable to live under or put into practice. It isn’t that I am afraid of the metaphorical abyss of nihilism; I’ve tread that edge before myself. No, I’ve just realized that it isn’t practical or useful. Never has it been said that reality had to be practical or useful, but our understanding of reality should be.

The only time I can think of when nihilism was acceptable is in the movie The Big Lebowski. Something about avowed nihilists beaten up by middle-aged bowlers strikes me as hilarious. If only nihilism was that easy to be rid of…

Just before this Christmas Holiday, Cathy Crovis from RipplesofImprovement.com tagged me for this rather morbid task of writing my own eulogy. I am supposed to write it to reflect the goals and dreams I have for the future. The purpose of this endeavor is to give focus to what I want to accomplish in my lifetime. Instead of using this opportunity to poke fun at myself and the task at hand, I thought it would be a nice change of pace to actually take this seriously. Well, not too seriously; after all, there is a point at which this could become depressing rather than enlightening. So, with no further explanation needed, and far too much given already, I present to you…

The Eulogy of John Michael Pageless

Photo by Maciej Lewandowski

Reverend John Michael Pageless lived a full life of joy, love, and worthy accomplishments in the field of religious tolerance and spiritual exploration. John Pageless, the son of Albert and Marie Pageless, began life in a lower-middle class family in the Baltimore County suburbs of Maryland. Although he and his family did struggle through economic hardships during his childhood, he still learned from the experience of his mother’s candor and open-minded views, as well as his father’s sensibilities and sense of humor. These traits would later become the hallmarks of a great man.

John Pageless was baptized Catholic, raised Lutheran and later non-denominational Christian, but was constantly infatuated with all the religions of the world. When he had become a teenager, he delved deeply into non-Christian religions, such as Buddhism and Qabalah, from which he would develop his views on God and religion now popularly known as Omnitheism.

In the fall of 2006, he married his best friend’s sister, Mrs. Pageless, with whom he would spend the rest of his life. He would later attribute his successes in life to Mrs. Pageless during her Eulogy, given only three years ago. He said, “Behind every good man, there is a great woman. It may be clique, but it wouldn’t have become a clique if it was not true. I am an example of such. One can hardly argue that we are both very successful in our later years together, but I would have to insist that her success was far greater than mine, as she was solely responsible for all of her own accomplishments, and a good portion of those attributed to myself. I would have never made it through seminary without her by my side…”

As a Minister of the Unitarian Universalist church, he became a staunch proponent of liberal religion and religious tolerance. With his inspiration, the Unitarian Universalist Association, in conjunction with other liberal churches and multi-faith organizations, challenged and defeated the political attacks on religious freedoms made by fundamentalists in the early part of the twenty first century. He also became known as America’s Minister, having written numerous best selling books on the subject of liberal religion, and was council for every president since Chelsea Clinton took office in 2017.

With his influence, John Pageless ensured equality for people of all peaceful religions - including the non-religious. He also reconfirmed the separation of church and state, and set up the United Nation’s World Religion Congress to promote interfaith dialogue on an international level. Yet despite his importance to the world at large, he never failed to place his duties as a husband and father ahead of his professional calling. He is survived by his son, David Alexander Pageless, and his daughter, Alexandra Diane Pageless, both of who have inherited their parents’ dedication to making the world a better place.

Rev. John Pageless had once said that he believed we each end so that someone else may begin. So as we reflect on the life of this man and mourn his passing, let us remember that his absence is a challenge to each of us to begin the journey to do great things. He invites us all to change the world as he did.

One thing this eulogy didn’t mention is how I would die. I want to have the privilege to reenact an ancient Sumarian ritual, recently found in the texts of the unearthed “Necronomicon.” After repeatedly assuring the audience that this ritual poses no danger, I would start the ritual that would result in the summoning of Cthulhu. This ancient demon-priest would then swallow me whole, leaving only my left foot for burial. My last words would be “I could be wrong.”

So that I am not the wet-blanket who ends this string of premature post-humorous remarks, I’m tagging Rev. Dan Harper of Yet Another Unitarian Universalist to write his own eulogy. I look forward to seeing what he writes and hope it involves another Mythos deity; after all, the world needs more H.P. Lovecraft references.

Despite my faith in the Divine, I don’t believe in an afterlife in the traditional sense. My sense of self, my ego, my intellect, will die with my body. To some, that thought is thoroughly depressing. I can certainly understand why. What level headed person wants to simply “end?” Yet, for me, it’s comforting. It’s the ultimate example of altruism; I end so others may begin. I decay, so that others may become. My name is forgotten, so that others may be known. I guess I’m not such a level headed person after all.

Someone who is currently struggling to find her own beliefs, particularly in regards life and death, recently helped me realize how someone comes to those conclusions. I could argue that my ideas concerning the afterlife is rooted in logic, historical facts, or even my personal holy text, the Gated Emptiness. None of this goes to the heart of how we come to our understanding of the universe around us; how we come to believing what we believe.

We feel the truth. We come to our conclusions purely by emotion, and then use reason to justify the conclusion. That doesn’t mean that our conclusions are wrong, but that does mean that my idea concerning the afterlife is no better or worse then those who believe differently. No one can be entirely certain that their ideas concerning the afterlife is the undeniable, absolute truth, absent of any origin in emotion. Even those folks who use science to back up their beliefs are choosing to rely on the experiments and experiences of thousands of men and women who are just as emotional and fallible as themselves. “Knowledge” itself is now questionable, if only because someone has to observe and interpret data to gain any use from it.

Thus the only thing we can really know is ourselves… and if you believe as I do, not even that is permanent. That is why, as an Omnitheist, I have to constantly remind myself that my view of the world isn’t the only “correct” view. I’m not perfect, but at the very least I can try.