There's outrage in Sydney, Australia today over a stunt pulled by the Church of Scientology. What was supposed to be a human rights forum for young people at the New South Wales state legislature turned out to be a chat session proselytizing for the movement founded by L. Ron Hubbard. Students, in fact, were given application forms to join the church (for a membership fee, naturally) along with a human rights pledge.
It's bad enough the organizer of the event -- who just happens to belong to the controversial Roman Catholic sub sect Opus Dei -- didn't do due diligence on this one. But promoting human rights? Have Scientologists forgotten that Hubbard made a number of disparaging remarks about Asians and blacks? Or that he supported apartheid?
The Catholic Church is certainly no saint when it comes to human rights -- after all, it made anti-Semitism a tenet of its faith until the 1960s. But as far as I know, it's never made membership in the church a condition of saying that one is for human rights. Nor does it ask people to sign a statement saying they support rights and then try to force them into the Church.
Indoctrination is simply uncalled for in this case. The students should get an apology.
Vote for this post at Progressive Bloggers.
No comments:
Post a Comment