L. Ron Hubbard. “Ron looks to the future with the sea org, ”

I was walking across a street near Horton Plaza downtown when suddenly a tiny, female voice came over my shoulder. "Would you like to take a free personality test?” I turned, finding a pair of wide, brown eyes which immediately locked onto mine. Her face was unwrinkled and not made up. her hair was long and beautiful, and she had one of the most gentle and sincere smiles I had ever seen on Broadway. I hesitated, but she pressed. "There is absolutely no obligation, and it does not cost anything..” Those big, honest eyes never lost contact with mine. How could I resist?

She led me to the Church of Scientology, which incongruously occupies part of the San Diego Senior Citizens Center. She quickly equipped me with a book of test questions, an answer sheet, and a pencil, she found me a seat in the office's anteroom, and then she disappeared Though a large window looked onto the busy street and the room was well decorated with Scientology books and posters (“Clear America Crusade” most of the posters announced in red, white and blue), it had a stark, institutional look and was dominated by a half dozen cafeteria-type tables. A dozen young men hunched over the same test I had.

I opened the book. The Oxford Capacity Analysis, the title page announced, and 200 questions followed. Do you have nervous habits? Are you comfortable in a room filled with strangers? Are you often tired? Are you in favor of “social security?” Part way through I looked up to see that beautiful face bringing in some more customers.

When each person finished this test, he would be taken to a rear office for a while. Most emerged from their post-testing "evaluation” without comment, but one came out and greeted his friends with, “Hey, man. this guy says I’m screwed up.” His evaluator just gave a confident smile.

A team of four evaluators, three men and one woman, was hard at work reviewing test results, each scientologist devoting all his attention to one non-scientologist in turn. The conference started out routinely, the scientologist getting vital statistics. Name, age, address, occupation. "Journalist,” I said, and her brow furrowed. She hesitated, then excused herself, leaving me to examine my new surroundings.

There were several color pictures of a white-haired gentleman wearing a yachtsman's hat and sunglasses standing on a ship at sea. “Ron looks to the future with the sea org, ” read the caption. Ron. I guessed, correctly, was the same L. Ron Hubbard who authored the many Scientology books in the other room. He seemed an unlikely messiah. Other posters urged "7x by May 7” with an apparent membership graph showing upward curves.

My evaluator returned with an older gentlemen. He introduced himself as Rev. Lauren Allen, the minister in charge of public relations for the San Diego Church. He found out what newspaper I worked for. We talked about journalists we both knew, and he told me a little about the church and its activities.

When he left, my attention was turned to an appalling graph of my personality. I had been rated in ten areas (stable, happy, composed, active, aggressive, causitive, agreeable, friendly and outgoing) on a chart divided into two parts, one labled "desirable" and the other "attention needed.” The "attention” section was further subdivided into three areas, “attention desirable, attention needed and attention urgent." I had three “desirable stales” and almost twice that many “attention urgents."

Behind my evaluator was a chart with two graphs. One was low like mine, but a higher line indicated the results of the church’s assistance.

With the church’s communication course, she explained. I could move myself into the "desirable state" and be a much happier individual. How much time could I devote to it each week? But how do I know I will be better off if I take the course, attaining the characteristics that will put me in the desirable state. I asked. She was puzzled, then asked what I wanted to be if I did not want to be happy. Pushing the question further, I told her I didn’t know, but that I want to be a writer and that the two greatest American writers of this century (William Faulkner and Ernest Hemingway) were somewhat unhappy people. Perhaps being unhappy is connected to being a good writer and I am better off unhappy? “Oh, no," she said, “scientology won’t get in the way of your career. The actress Karen Black is a scientologist and she has been very successful.” We parted, recommending books to each other. She wanted me to read Hubbard's first book, Dianetics, the foundation of Scientology. I suggested Brave New World, a world in which there is no unhappiness.

It's hard to make a religion grow in size these days, but Scientology seems to have done it. In San Diego, for example, the church has gone from a meagre beginning two and a half years ago to some 3,000 members now and is dickering over the purchase of the old Thearle building downtown (asking price $750,000) for a new headquarters. Worldwide, church officials are hoping to double membership to 28 million persons this year.

Central to Scientologist doctrine is the idea that people have become burdened with ideas which prevent the best parts of themselves from expression. The goal of Scientology is to relieve oneself of these preconceived notions which clutter up the "reactive mind” to allow one's "analytical mind” to bring happiness and joy into life. "Pastoral counseling" (also called “auditing”) is the way to wipe out the bad carryovers from past experience and become “clear.” If the Scientologist goal to “clear" the entire world could be realized.there would be universal peace, happiness and no wars, they say.

Rev. Allen gave a personal example of how auditing had helped to “clear” one of his personal problems. Using standard procedure, he had taken hold of two empty tin cans connected to an E-Meter, a scientologist device which measures bodily resistance to 7.5 volt electric current. Scientologists say the E-Meter registers emotional stress. "Images kept flashing through my mind,” he recalled. “One of them that kept popping up again and again was one of a little black and white puppy. Every time it did I thought, why do I keep thinking about that puppy? Why can't 1 think of the problem? But every time I thought of it my auditor asked, ‘That. What was that?”'The E-Meter had jumped every time Allen thought of the dog. “Then I remembered.” he said, “that when I was very small a friend of my father’s had brought over a box of tiny puppies. I wanted one of those puppies more than anything else in the world. I kept petting and squeezing one of them. Then my father put the puppy back into the box and said to his friend, ‘you'll have to take these back. He is too rough with them.' Ever since then, I realized, I had been afraid to handle things because of a fear I would lose them. Whether it was teeth, a job, a marriage... I was afraid to do anything with it for fear of losing it.”

Going clear is an arduous process. Rev. Allen knows one woman who did it in the miraculously short time of seven months ("and she had been in analysis for 14 years.” he added), but usually it takes much longer. There are only about 30 clears in San Diego.

It is also expensive. The church requires fixed donations for each of its services and courses(“each person should pay for exactly what they gel”) and Allen estimates the price tag on becoming clear is between $4.000 and 55.000. At one time the state of "clear" was the highest to which Scientologists could aspire, but now they can go even higher, to various degrees of “.operating thetan." Pastoral counseling costs $50 per hour, and Scientology offers a number of courses intended to help people become auditors and understand Scientology.

The San Diego's church's income currently varies between $3,000 and $15,000 per week. The largest item in the budget (30 percent of income) goes to the salaries of the 45 staff members, and the rest goes to uses such as the building fund, tithes to the world church, and refunds to dissatisfied scientologists. The Church has a standing rule that anyone who is unhappy with a course can get his entire donation back if he asks for it within 90 days after the class ends and signs a statement pledging to have nothing further to do with Scientology. "We make them sign the pledge because we don't think they should come back if they do not find scientology rewarding," said Rev. Allen. "Also, without it someone could take all the courses for free. He could ask for a refund after every one."

Founder and de facto leader of the church is L. Ron Hubbard, a former writer of science fiction (Final Blackout), westerns (Buckskin Brigade), and screenplays. In 1950 he wrote a book called Dianetics. the Modern Science of Mental Health. The book has gone through 28 printings in the twenty-three and a half years since then, and it forms the basis for scientology. Since then. Hubbard has written a library-full of additional books, most of them further explaining and expanding dianetics and scientology. Hubbard is in constant contact with Scientology churches via teletype and telephone, but his exact whereabouts are fuzzy since he lives at sea on the Apollo, a 300 foot ship owned and operated by the worldwide Church of Scientology. “It keeps him away from people who would pester him. like newspaper reporters," one San Diego scientologist said. "It gives him a chance to write. Also, there are a lot of people who would like to kill Ron because he is trying to improve the world.”

Scientology has had no lack of detractors in the 20 years it has existed. It has been strongly criticized by organized medicine on grounds it practices amateur psychology, it was once outlawed in Australia and Hubbard, an American, was once prohibited from entering Great Britain.

In 1967 the federal government took away the national church's tax-exempt non-profit status because Hubbard was receiving too much income from the church. The Food and Drug Administration once seized E-Meters but was forced to release them after courts ruled they are religious items. Most recently, a former Los Angeles Scientologist won a $300.000 suit against the church after he alleged he was the victim of severe harassment as a result of anti-scientology testimony he delivered in court. He said he was attacked under a Scientology policy called "fair game” which suspends the Scientology Code of Ethics for anyone who leaves the church. Rev. Allen, however, said the “fair game” policy has been revoked.

Scientology has often received rough treatment in the press, and has filed over 100 libel and slander suits, to counter bad publicity.

Its greatest proponents are its members. Open and to all appearances happy, they welcome visitors to their headquarters and are eager to talk about scientology.

"I like it because it makes me feel so good,” said Rodney Bryant, an ex-heroin addict who will roll up his sleeves to prove it. "Scientology helped get me off it (heroin)." he says. "I took the communications course for four days straight and I never felt any withdrawal." Since then, it has been nothing but good times.

He is a member of the San Diego staff, working 9:30 a.m. to 10:30 p.m.. plus weekends for $47 per week take-home pay and free pastoral counseling. He also gets scholarships for scientology classes and hopes to be a leader of the San Diego Church someday. “I could be laying carpet, making four or five dollars per hour.” he said. "But what good would that be to me. I'd just be able to buy meaningless material goods." He looks you right in the eye. and smiles. “Am I hooked on scientology? I'm hooked on a feeling, feeling good. If 1 could find better I'd waTV right out that door. So would most of the people here. Ron would, too.”

He is not “clear” yet. “My reactive mind is like a big mass.” he said. "Sometimes I can lift it up a little and see beyond it. But then it clamps down again." How will he know when he is clear? "Oh. you know. Believe me. you know it when it happens," he said with a big grin. In the headquarters, everyone-gets along well together and has a good time together. "I'm glad you noticed the friendliness." Rod said.

Nearby, the communications course, the most basic scientology class, is going on. It is composed of a series of lessons starting w ith two people just getting comfortable sitting closely and facing each other and moving on to listening closely, giving commands and taking insults. Drills include having one student give orders to another ("Look at the wall, touch the wall, step away from the wall") to reading out of books and sitting quietly while another person criticizes the student.

"The class has made me a lot more comfortable with girls." said one communications student during a break. “I'm able to just sit and talk with them.”

Another student said he is better able to take instructions and complaints in his job. A sailor said it helps him cope with Navy life. “When my chief is coming down on me I just say OK. that’s fine, and not worry about it.”

And then there was another student who was enthusiastic about j the scientology doctrine that man j has a spiritual being which is apart from his mind and body. “Scientology has shown me that there is i something that is me. I always : knew I had a body.” he said, i slapping his forearm. “But I never ! thought of anything as being really | me.”