Free Speech within the EU

dw-world.de/dw/article/0,156 … 44,00.html

Greece is a member of the European Union and, so you would think, not a religious state in which an artist’s freedom of expression is kicked to the ground.

Of course, several EU countries such as Germany imprison people for expressing right-wing viewpoints. The UK discourages free speech with its libel / slander laws.

Greece has a long history of noncompliance with EU directives. In terms of human-rights type stuff, a few years ago they closed down some Buddhist centers and yoga ashrams for secretly running unauthorized religious groups. You see, you have to apply to be a religious group, and if the Orthodox Church doesn’t want you registered (they hate everybody), then you can’t hold meetings. If memory serves, the Buddhists were claiming to teach Tibetan (or was it Sanskrit?) while the yoga people didn’t think they were a religion.

The good news is, they’ve got a big scandal going on with the Archbishop of Athens. Maybe all the Greeks will turn Buddhist soon!

Yep, freedom of religion in Greece is a dream for now:
http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/irf/2004/35458.htm
And for Europe too:
http://www.religioustolerance.org/rt_euro.htm

Europeans distinguish between religion and cult. Cults will face problems, as they usually exploit their members by means of brainwashing and other stuff.

US on the other hand does not want to define what is religion and what is cult and totally leaves it up to the consumer.

You can do what you want in Europe, but will face some opposition from the state (like rejecting cult members for official positions), if your organizations gets big AND handles its members rough, like this famous SF cult is doing. I forgot their name now, it is this stuff were Travolta is a member and they believe we only need to meditate to become members of a big galactic civilization. They seem to be quite big in US, in Europe we consider them to be … well Travoltas and do not really care about them.

That would be “Scientology,” of course. For more info about them, check out xenu.org (Warning! This site is apparently maintained by Lord Xenu, the evil enemy galactic leader whom Scientologists oppose!)

To me, it seems obvious that the Scientologists are basically like the mafia, and should be shunned / shut down / disbanded / whatever. On the other hand, there’s nothing they’ve done that the Catholics, Muslims, etc. haven’t done too. So is it just a question of proportions? Instititonal guilt? Does how new they are really have anything to do with it? (Gotta watch those New Age / Wiccan types.)

J. Gordon Melton says a cult is “a religion I don’t like.” Other people have checklists, but it’s real tough to keep (say) the Greek Orthodox from qualifying–especially when some elements thereof probably ARE cultic. Just my two drachma (from the pre-Euro days).