The church claims that it has as many as 10 million members worldwide, but critics have suggested the actual number is far less. Melton said that the number of OT-VIIs and OT-VIIIs is in the hundreds. After years of study and introspection, achieving OT is supposed to create the kind of euphoria Kent referred to.

"The OT levels improve a person's life," said the current OT-V Scientologist, who did not want to be named. "All I know is I went through it and it changed my life dramatically. There is so much 'case'" -- a Scientology term meaning, essentially, mental blockage -- "a person has. Reactivity, aberration, things that are not you. The Bridge gets rid of all that stuff. I have the ability to show love to anyone -- from presidents down to bums. I can show love for anyone because I admire that being."

OTs are also warned that any vacillation from the courses and auditing can be dangerous. "Beginning with OT-III, you're taught that if you don't follow the prescribed steps precisely, you could become very sick," said the former OT-VII member. He stressed that he was not a critic of the church but had left because of personal differences.

Adding to all that stress is a series of very heavy theological revelations that begin with OT-III. The central creation story, according to Melton, Bartchy, Kent and the former member, is this: About 75 million years ago, a nefarious intergalactic warlord called Xenu rounded up the inhabitants of numerous planets, killed them, and brought them to Earth, then set off a chain reaction of cataclysmic volcanoes (the volcano pictured on the "Dianetics" cover was Hubbard's favorite symbol for the notion of breakthrough and self-actualization), which dispersed their thetans into the atmosphere. These thetans now fester inside the bodies of all humans. They are to be located in specific body parts and summoned out.

"Part of the problem is how literally that is to be understood," Melton said. "There are those who take it quite literally and those who don't take it literally at all." Then there is the problem of the church's alleged treatment of OTs who have attempted to abandon the faith. Celebrity or not, an apostate Cruise might run into trouble.

"I doubt that Travolta or the other celebrities know what I know from people of how they're treated when they try to leave," Bartchy said. "What is probably told to the celebrities is that these are just very disgruntled people who aren't to be taken seriously."

Melton said only, "If you were a high-ranking member and simply said, 'I'm quitting, bye,' they look on you with a certain amount of animosity."

How does the church respond to such criticism? "I am aware that a small cadre of anti-religious extremists are trying to generate hostility against Scientology by disseminating lies about it," Parkin wrote in response to questions about the OT teachings and church policy. "This little group of insignificant people are the only ones in the world who are obsessed with extracting and altering out of context bits of esoteric data about Scientology and using it to create prejudice against Scientology through reporters such as yourself who buy into their agenda."

If all of this is not too much to bear for Holmes or others contemplating Scientology as a religious choice -- as it seems not to have been for Cruise -- the process, at his level anyway, may prove quite enjoyable. According to "What Is Scientology?" a book put out by Bridge Publications, the church's lucrative publishing arm, part or all of OT-VII and OT-VIII must be performed in the church's headquarters in Clearwater, Fla., or aboard the Freewinds, a ship that houses parts of the church's upper management. Happily, the weather makes up for the deprivations of sea life: The Freewinds is usually docked off the Caribbean island of Curaçao.

But should either of them decide to leave Scientology one day, Cruise and Holmes may also find themselves in a contractual bind. Scientologists are strongly encouraged to sign covenants of faith. And these aren't contracts for the uncommitted; according to Melton, Kent and the current Scientologist, the most fervent covenant -- which is common -- has a duration of 1 billion years.

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