J. Swift
Patron with Honors
As covered by Tony Ortega, a group calling itself the LA Faith Coalition issued a press release for what it called an "Emergency Interfaith Conference." I'd never been to one of those and it sounded very important.
I headed North on the 101 through the Cahuenga Pass. Twenty minutes later I was there. From the moment I saw two rows of chairs I knew the event would be a bust. There was no emergency interfaith anything.
The event was not a press conference at all. There were no questions and answers and no media present. The event was Scientology complaining about Leah Remini's show -- and yet Leah and her show were never even once mentioned by name. Again we see that OSA cannot even speak Leah's name. This made the event all the more confusing as the rented clergy spoke in vague terms about social media and a television show. An uninformed person off the street would have no idea what was actually being discussed. In Scientology terms there was no R Factor.
Most of the "audience" were senior OSA personnel in Uniform K (business wardrobe). What does one call a group of OSA people doing a bogus event? I choose the term a "Grifter of OSA." The event was a complete grift, a con, a hustle. And like a back alley dice game, it was small and covert. A few OSA people had rolled the dice and they came up snake eyes. David Miscavige once again looks like a bad joke.
The grifter of OSA, along with the SMP film crew, were 90% of the tens of attendees. The choir was hired as were the rent-a-clergyman. There were, by my estimate, fifteen Burbank PD. The BPD officers were very polite, courteous, and professional. The BPD probably wondered why Scientology needed so much security for this non-event when the only real threats were boredom and the fraud of a fake event -- and even these threats were posed by Scientology itself.
After the event was over, the hired choir got in their cars and drove off. They did not stay for refreshments in the Fellowship Hall. It was just another gig for them.
In context, N. Alameda is a busy street in the heart of the Burbank-Universal City studio district. The Disney Studios are huge. The Redeemer Church is small. Anyone driving by wouldn't notice a smallish event on a patch of concrete and grass between the sanctuary and the small fellowship hall with the orange doors. This is what the Church looks like from across the street:
I headed North on the 101 through the Cahuenga Pass. Twenty minutes later I was there. From the moment I saw two rows of chairs I knew the event would be a bust. There was no emergency interfaith anything.
The event was not a press conference at all. There were no questions and answers and no media present. The event was Scientology complaining about Leah Remini's show -- and yet Leah and her show were never even once mentioned by name. Again we see that OSA cannot even speak Leah's name. This made the event all the more confusing as the rented clergy spoke in vague terms about social media and a television show. An uninformed person off the street would have no idea what was actually being discussed. In Scientology terms there was no R Factor.
Most of the "audience" were senior OSA personnel in Uniform K (business wardrobe). What does one call a group of OSA people doing a bogus event? I choose the term a "Grifter of OSA." The event was a complete grift, a con, a hustle. And like a back alley dice game, it was small and covert. A few OSA people had rolled the dice and they came up snake eyes. David Miscavige once again looks like a bad joke.
The grifter of OSA, along with the SMP film crew, were 90% of the tens of attendees. The choir was hired as were the rent-a-clergyman. There were, by my estimate, fifteen Burbank PD. The BPD officers were very polite, courteous, and professional. The BPD probably wondered why Scientology needed so much security for this non-event when the only real threats were boredom and the fraud of a fake event -- and even these threats were posed by Scientology itself.
After the event was over, the hired choir got in their cars and drove off. They did not stay for refreshments in the Fellowship Hall. It was just another gig for them.
In context, N. Alameda is a busy street in the heart of the Burbank-Universal City studio district. The Disney Studios are huge. The Redeemer Church is small. Anyone driving by wouldn't notice a smallish event on a patch of concrete and grass between the sanctuary and the small fellowship hall with the orange doors. This is what the Church looks like from across the street:
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