Actually, RMackie, I could find a couple other examples of religions with "secret levels"...
But in any event, something I personally find interesting is that Hubbard seemed to want to take Scn in a different direction and seemed proud of this. BUT he also wrote a policy letter advising church members to give people some context in explaining Scn to them, about how it can be similar to other religions. So you get a dichotomy there, I think. On one hand, oh look how unique it is, on the other hand, no, no, we're just like the other guys.
Well, the way I see it is this: Scn and CofS make and made the mistakes that other ologies, isms and churches have made. There is a bit of commonality here and there belief-wise, but the combination of self help discipline, religious theory, UFO-ology and so on are relatively unique. It wouldn't matter one jot to me whether or not Scn was unique or just like all the other guys if only there weren't so many problematic and abusive aspects to it. What particularly pisses me off is Hubbard's assurance that he dunnit rite whereas the other guys did it rong then he proceeded to behave no better than the most corrupt medieval popes in history.