Are the beliefs of Scientologists really all that strange when compared to more established religions?
How strange something is is subjective, strangeness is in the eye of the beholder. Someone raised as a Scientologist probably would not find anything strange about it at all. Christian beliefs are ingrained in our culture and many people have grown up with them, so most people would be fairly comfortable with them and not find them strange at all. Anyone raised in a country dominated by Christianity would have heard of the Noah’s ark flood story when they were little, so the story would be familiar to them and not strange. If you were to look at it objectively, yes – you may come to the conclusion that Scientology beliefs are no more strange than mainstream religious beliefs. But to do that you will need to firstly develop an objective way of measuring ‘strangeness’.
