Alas, what exactly that something is? We aren’t sure! The stretch of SW Third in front of the organization’s newly expanded and rennovated offices—which happen to be right by the Mercury‘s offices—is largely blocked off. Several Klieg lights, turned on and bright even in the middle of the afternoon, are set up on the opposite side of the street from the building’s entrance, near the Silverado gay bar and the Portland Outdoor Store. These lights are pointed at a stage that’s being erected in the street, beneath a giant green bow that’s been affixed to the building.
I asked the employees of a nearby food cart if they’d heard anything about was going on; their response, which I desperately want to believe, is that ANTONIO BANDERAS is coming to town this weekend to celebrate the grand opening of Portland’s spiffed-up Scientology HQ. (Banderas isn’t on this list, but he was in Interview with the Vampire with Tom Cruise… COINCIDENCE??!!)
The first thought I had about this big production is that it might be related to Scientology’s practice of setting up the “Ideal Orgs” that former Village Voice editor Tony Ortega has written about:
As [Scientology leader David] Miscavige has pushed his followers to raise money in extreme quantities to buy up these large buildings and renovate them, there’s been a real question about their purpose. Church membership itself hasn’t been growing, and the Ideal Orgs are replacing smaller facilities that weren’t out of space.
That info seems to match with Portland’s previous, far more humble Scientology offices, which were always sparsely populated whenever I’d walk by. But back to Ortega: While he notes that openings of such buildings come only after “local Scientologists… are encouraged to mortgage their homes and max out their credit cards in donations so the church can buy a historic property in their area that needs renovation,” Scientology’s PR department focuses on the dramatic impact those buildings can have—particularly their grand openings, which “are attended by thousands of parishioners, guests and dignitaries from across the social spectrum.”
Which leads to something else interesting, this time from Ortega’s dedicated Scientology site: A recent story headlined “Scientology is Staking Everything On Portland Like It Actually Matters.” That post takes a look at information gathered by former Scientology spokesman Mike Rinder, with particular interest paid to this Portland-centric flyer that calls Portland “The First Scientology City.”
A call to that number from the Mercury office has yet to be returned.
So now, my fellow Portland residents, we are left with one very important QUESTION:
• Will ANTONIO BANDERAS be in Portland this weekend???
Freaky weirdness. They’ve been buying up expensive real estate nationwide lately, aggressively wringing the money out of their followers. It becomes a nice (empty) asset for the church, and a wealth transfer from their own people.
Judging from the anti-fluoride people, Portland is a hotbed of sucker, er, potential clears.
Scientology, where your hard earned cash buys enlightenment.
Or not.
This can only mean one thing.
FLUORIDE.
Right across from Silverado, and its douchey straight counterpart next door, down the street from the tourists who wait in hour long lines for donuts, and a hot spot for street kids with dogs. This is the perfect place for a religious center that shuns psychiatry.
Actually, shunning psychiatry is about the only thing I like about them.
Maybe the Scientologists want to celebrate the 20th anniversary of winning tax free status in the United States. JACKPOT!
Because nothing says Portland like a 714 area code phone number.
Why does Tony Ortega former Village Voice/Backpage.com spokesperson get quoted in Portland about Scientology? seems a little odd.
Comparing those photos with Google Streetview, they did some serious branch-cutting on those trees. Do they own them or are they city property?
They talk a lot about “humanitarianism” etc. But whatever they’re up to, you can be sure that power-mad profiteering is the real motive. They’re like Satan’s Amway franchise.
Every Scientologist within 500 miles of Portland has been “requested” to attend to inflate the seeming numbers of their members in the area. Since Scientology owns a private school in Sheridan, I would expect to see a hundred or so children bused into Portland on a “field trip” to further create the illusion of a large Scientology population.
Scientology excels at selling illusions to the uninformed.
Isn’t that what all religions do?
Oh no! They want Portland to become a “scientology city?” Watch out! It would be such a huge, huge shame for Portland to become another Clearwater, Florida. Just ask the non-scientologist residents of that formerly quaint town how that’s working out for them. I sincerely hope the good people of Portland have chosen their city officials very carefully and weeded out anyone who might be vulnerable to lining their pockets with scieno cash in exchange for favorable treatment.
I look to the Portland Mercury for intelligently written helpful, informative news, entertainment and sports. I don’t look to the Portland Mercury for unintelligent xenophobic bashing. There’s not a single person writing or reading this article that doesn’t have something in their life, some belief, some passion, some endeavor, some “whatever” that everyone here would agree with. So shall we start attacking each other for OUR beliefs because their unusual or we don’t agree with them then? Of course not. That accomplishes nothing and we’re better than that. I don’t know much about Scientology, but I do know that its legal in the U.S., as are Catholicism, Islam, Judaism, Methodist, Baptist, Christian, and many other religious beliefs. We shouldn’t condemn someone just for existing and practicing their beliefs. That is unintelligent and bigoted, especially when we know nothing or little about them beyond what people who clearly have an axe to grind tell us. Can we raise the journalistic standards a bit here? Can the Portland Mercury attempt to serve the community with valid insight, background, interviews, etc. rather than a dog pile like attack on something we didn’t understand before this article understand and still don’t because the article fell short of informing us comprehensively? How about an interview with a Scientology official? Or the history of Portland and Scientology? Something that would contribute to the Portland community’s understanding of our new neighbors? Aim higher guys. Think higher. Thank you.
Come for the protest with anons, May 11, across the street from the cult grand opening. There will be caek! Promise.
I guess the recent visit from the Dalai Lama about faith, love and the environment never made it to the ears or heart of this author. His Holiness stated that ALL religions share the principles of love, compassion, and forgiveness and I personally think people (believers or non believers) should build on this theory. I’m not sure why this is article is making a big deal over this event but it scares me to think that a progressive city may be falling under the spell of fear usually found in towns known for discrimination. Please stop the hate, it only serves to make us enemies of one another, which will ultimately lead to the destruction of humankind.
I do not comprehend why a report on a church opening would be anything else other than informative at the least, and celebratory at the most. Why wouldn’t we view such a thing as an signifier of religious diversity and flourishing religious freedom? I’m not really sure why Portland Mercury is presenting this event as an “alert” or something to be cautious about. I don’t understand why it links to a biased article as well. Whatever happened to religious tolerance? Whatever happened to objective reporting? This post reeks of bias and bigotry, ignoring the perspective of those who would actually look forward to the event and deem it as something to be excited about. I also have doubts about the credibility of this writer, when one of his sources is “the employees of a nearby food cart.” Did the writer even care to fact-check? And if Antonio Banderas is coming then great! And to take Tony Ortega as a main source, and quote him, when his anti-Scientology agenda is well known, I do not understand. Why not balance it out with a counter statement? No more real journalism these days.
Oh I know plenty about scientology. It is not a religion (is only cloaked as one for tax exemption purposes) and is not about love or understanding. I nreality it is quite the nasty criminal organization. But yes, I encourage Portland journalists and residents to learn all they can about scientology on your own. What you find will be disturbing. But yes, do your own research. Don’t listen to me.
Here are a few phrases anyone can Google to get started on your own personal research:
“Where is Shelly Miscavige?” (wife of scientology’s leader)
“Who was Lisa McPherson?”
“scientology money”
“scientology cult”
“scientology mind control”
“scientology human trafficking”
“Narconon Georgia fraud”
“Narconon Arrowhead deaths”
I have a tough time not believing any brand-spanking-new commenters aren’t Scientologists.
@Ophelia:
Not you’ll tell me you don’t believe BeReal, ExpectMore and SearchforTruth are completely separate individualism.
I FOR ONE WELCOME OUR NEW XENU OVERLORDS:
http://www.southparkstudios.com/full-episo…
Why is Antonio Banderas going to endorse Scientology? He is a Catholic, and Scientology coerces women into abortion and sued the Daughters of St. Paul in Italy because the published books by Catholic journalist Alberto Laggia and Catholic ex-Scientologist Maria Pia Gardini?
http://bit.ly/55fwFT
Looks like we have some scientology minions posting on Blogtown! Even after the fluoride debacle, I can’t believe that Portland would go the way of scientologists. That’s full on whackjobery, not religion, and too pretentious and rich for Portland style.
Just YouTube “Ideal Org Opening”. They buy up old buildings. Coerce the local members to pay for it. They then re-coerce them to pay for its renovation. Then when the local members can’t afford the renovation cost, corporate Scientology swoops in to pay for it with the deal that corporate Scientology now owns the building. Also known as a raw deal. Then the local members have to pay rent for the building they bought.
Portland knows that scientology is a pile of crap. Only now they have gone over their heads with huge buildings (which are bought with donations, then GIVEN to the cult, who they rent it back from!)
Good luck paying the heating bill in that place, when the world hates scientology.
I guess they won’t be mentioning the Narconon deaths and lawsuits which are bringing that arm of the cult down.
People of Portland are not stupid, and they know how to Google. Scientology is over.
@V_Mathison: Actually, they are trying desperately to bring in people from all over, not just from “500 miles around” as an earlier commenter suggested. They have been bombing their e-mail list globally to try to get people to fly in and attend this event. And once those suckers are in the house, they’ll be hounded mercilessly for donations. Internal e-mails leaked to the Web have suggested that the cult intends to target $3 million in donations from those attending, though, given the cult’s dwindling membership, that seems a mite optimistic.
That said, given the small space they’re setting up in, they’ll be lucky to have 600 people in the audience, and anywhere from 200 to 300 of those will probably be captives: students and staff from the Delphian Academy, the cult’s boarding school down by McMinnville. If there are more than 200 dues-paying Scientologists in Portland at this point (other than those affiliated with Delphian), I would be quite surprised.
The public scientologsit and the private scientologist are parallel paths. You will see smiling,happy glad handing people at this event but make no mistake, you are a resource for money and they will put you into debt for their own wealth. This is not some 10% tithing organization, this is a 100% bankrupting organization that doesn’t stop there. They don’t just take all your money, they take it going forward for the “good of the planet” or to “Keep scientology working”. They will sit with you for hours until you hand over the money and then they will hit you up again with another part of the organization at the same event. What you see is not what you get when you meet these people. This is truly a group for which cynicism is actually healthy. Unless you truly understand thought control …..Stay Away. … Anonymous is doing us a favor exposing these people.
Look, I am a Scientologist and I know the truth. My case supervisor told me Scientology has been the fastest growing religion in the world every year for the past 60 years, and still is today. She said there are over 40 million Scientologists in the world today. The world loves us. In portland alone we have about 500,000 active Scientologists. So there.
If only a few thousand show up at the Portland ideal org opening it is only because the other 498 thousand of our local scientologists are busy saving the planet. Literally. We are the authorities on the mind. And on lots of other stuff too. We have powers mere humanoids only dream about. Want an example? Yesterday I was in a parking lot. I was looking for a space. There was none open. So I postulated a parking space, and no more than 10 minutes later a lady pulled out of a space. That’s what I’m talking about. Yes, its true, Spiritual Power costs Money, lots of money, but so what? I spent over 500,000 dollars for these powers and I’m not gonna stop now. On my next level Scientology is gonna give me the power to control all of Matter Energy Space Time (and other people too). In Scientology we have a secret saying (and a secret handshake too). Our secret saying is this I am a God and you are a Wog. Get it? Lol. Join us, and bring money, and you too can make parking spaces simply appear.
I am a new poster and I am not a $cientologist.
I picked up a link from exscn.net which is one of the many on-line places you can find out about the scams these clams pull.
Heh, google clam and scientology together for some hilarious insight!
The pro $cientology posts are clearly $ciTrolls. There is data, testimony, video evidence, and more that clearly indicates that Scientology is a dangerous cult that destroys families, impoverishes followers, and engages in criminal activity to advance its agenda.
I think I saw Jay and Silent Bob walking down Hawthorne yesterday. I don’t think that they are Scientologists.
You’re not a real religion until you’ve got a full-blown real estate scam under your belt.
@ExpectMore: I believe the term is “Xenuphobic”.