From: jensting@imaginet.fr (Jens Tingleff) Newsgroups: alt.religion.scientology Subject: LYON TRIAL French Press report 5/10 [Xenu] Date: Sat, 05 Oct 1996 16:51:20 +0100 Organization: ARSCC Operation Clean the Planet Lines: 187 Message-ID: [Summary/piecemeal translation of article of the day in connection with the trial in Lyon of 23 clams. From Liberation, liberal/leftish French daily French original in single quotes. Comments/unclear points in square brackets. Apologies for my French, gotta get a dictionary one of these days... For 'sect' you may want to read 'cult'. Copyrights stated as being Liberation, by default (i.e. there are no explicit copyright notices with the articles] Three articles today. One full page. Quand al scientologie s'en remet a la faculte 'When scientology goes back to university' [or somesuch ;-) ] Bernard Fromentien Liberation, 5/10 -96, page 13 Copyright 1996 Liberation [Picture of Bryan Dorell, Bryan Wilson and Frank Finn] ======================================================================= The representatives of the church opf scientology have stated themselves reasy to "face an accusation of heresy." Friday, on the fifth day of the trial testimonies from academics attempted to validate the claim of the 23 accused in Lyon: that they're members of true church based on a proper religion. The day opened, however, with the testimony of father Trouslard. True to his militant image, he asserted that "to claim that one can be at times catholic and at times scientologist is a fraud!" he wishes to send to the devil "this intellectual construction fabricated in all ways to escape justice, hiding its commercial objectives behind a religious facade." A series of international scholars whose writings have been widely circulated by the sect then proceeded to attempt to answer this charge ['faire piece a cette charge sans appel']. All claim to be independent. After a close study of scientology literature, Karel Dobelaire, sociology professor from Catholic University of Louvain (Belgium) concludes "scientology has all the qualities required to be defined as a religion." Its success takes its roots in a "technology which works," which, in his eys, explains why scientology "requests money for the servies they offer. Bryan Wilson, sociology professor from Oxford (UK) compares auditing to catholic confession, the adherents have interieur "clarifications" practised under the authority of members ['officants'] of the "church" founded by the american Ron Hubbard: "the believer is thusly in the hands of a priest ... It's a religious process which permits beelievers to enter a relationship siwth their outside existence." With the testimony of Frank K Wilson, the defense became more polemic. On the strength of 400 conversations with scientologists, the auxilliary [probably assistant - doesn't look young at all, though...] professor of religious studies in Washington predicts: "In the united states as well as in Europe, the accpetance of scientology is only a matter of time." Discoursing on the theme of "state persecution" to which the french adherents object, he proclaims: "when christianity was disseminated, Roman writers accused them forming a dangerous sect who refused to worship the gods of the state. My hope is that we don't bow ['nous ne dressions pas'] to the new gods of the state. The witnesse were invited by the defense to define the anglo-saxon meanings of the words "sect" "religion" and "tolerance." Yves Leborgne [denoted 'Me Yves Leborgne' - could be 'Maitre'] insists on the words "fraud" and "escrow" ['fraude' and 'escroquerie' - I've been translating 'escroquerie' with "fraud", so sue me ;-)]. He lashes out at at Karel Delaere [different spellings of names in original text] "what difference do you make between unverifiable claims made by an established religion and escrow?" The reply of the Belgian professor: "all religions are founded on the promise of transforming the individual into a spiritual being. It's a belief whic cannot be verified empirically." A semantic counter-offensive, intended to bestow on scientology the status of a "politically religion treated like an anit-cultural phenomenon." This is the credo of the Italian Massimo Introvigne, founder of the Centreof studies of new religions i Turin. He is indignated by the "French polemic" on sects. He pleads for a more nuanced view on "new religious movements," he is ironic: "I ask myself if there are really more suicides in scientology than in the French police or amongst Italian religious students?" In his eyes, scientology is guilty of no great wrong ['n'est guere coupable que de peches veniels']: "as in all religious movements, there are overzealous missionaries who make mistakes." Stil shrouded in mystery remains the mystery revealed by father Trouslard, who confirmed that scientolgists had managed to discover the identities of persons inrerviewed behind closed doors by the parliamentary commision on sects and even obtain their secret written statements. "Unexplainable," commented Jacques Guyard, raporteur to the commision. "All the minutes of the interviews were kept in a coffer." An investigation is in progress. The taking of testimonies at the stand is concluded tonight. Monday will be focussed on pleads by the civil parties and the official viewpoint ['requisitoire du ministiere public']. ======================================================================= Le fisc surt la piste du financement des sectes 'The treasury on the track of cult financing' Nidam Abdi Liberation, 5/10 -96, page 13 Copyright 1996 Liberation ======================================================================= The most effective means of destabilise sects without touching on freedom of belief is to hit them in wallet. even though the leadership of the tax authorities may not recognise this, a cell of official inverstigators are charged with uncovering the financing of sects. These are numerous in different tax offices trying to trace the money of such organisations. This is the case of Gerard (not his real name) [!!!!], investigator in the Parsien region. [Discussion of how the tax people track down movements who are only non-profit in name. Partly through accidental discoveries (a woman walks off a plane, customs officiels discover more than 100000 FFR and valuables), partly through careful analysis of work carried out for free for a non-profit organisation (if there are services rendered below cost, the tax people hit the seller/provider with tax for the real price..). On occasion, they have the problem that the guru of the sect is completely unknown.] ======================================================================= La Vitamin C pour faciliter les "purifications" 'Vitamin C to facilitate "purificvation"' B. Bn Liberation, 5/10 -96, page 13 Copyright 1996 Liberation ======================================================================= [Fluff piece about vitamin C. The writer seems to think that vitamin C is the most dangerous element of a purif rundown. Sigh.] ======================================================================= Comments: What a TERRIBLE defense! The clams have been steadily accused of using hardsales techniques (so hard people kill themselves over failure to find money), for obscene profit (30000 FFR for taking vitamines, runnning around and sitting in a sauna) totally giving lie to the claim of being a non-profit organisation. Their response: we really, really, REALLY, believe that we're a religion; now let us go, you witch-hunters and crucifiers. Operation "foot, bullet" in court! The defense has not at all addressed the points being made by the prosecution. They didn't even try to rebutt the statement that purif rundowns kill your liver, your kidneys and your brain. The expert witnesses were mainkly useless (in my view). The two European academics very carefully defined religions as beliefs in nonverifiable claims, and acknowledged that scientolgy beliefs are nonverifiable. (So what?) The American sounds a little less balanced. Why would scientology be recognised in the future, if it hasn't even managed to be recognised now? The Italian cracking jokes about suicides and telling off French people must have gone down like a lead balloon ;-) I wonder why the clams dug up two sociology profs from Europe (I thought we *did* have profs of religion...). The teaser about the documents from the parliamentary investigatyion sounds like another foot-bullet job. It is *not* a bright idea to gain access (by unknown, presumed clandestine, means) to documents which the parliament wants kept secret... This is a government which didn't have any problem with ordering police to axe down the door of a church (right in front of the TV cameras); how much trouble would they have deciding to nail the clams for good? The story from the tax office sounded a bit cloak-and-dagger like. (Keeping the first name of the guy in Paris secret ;-) ) However, these are effective ways of persuing big organisation who make a lot of money. Although the Paris org was officially bankrupted, the effectiveness of that seems questionable. New orgs sprang up in Paris, and I'd be surprised if the money hadn't started flowing back again... More on Tuesday Jens ------ No PGP signature, no authenticity. Vive La France!! ---------- Scientology[tm] ?? Check it out at http://www.scientology.org *and* http://www.cybercom.net/~rnewman/scientology/home.html Report interesting conclusions to alt.religion.scientology ;-)