Paul Haggis: Welcome to the (relatively) Free World

I would personally like to extend a very warm welcome and congratulations on speaking out about Scientology, to Paul Haggis who is best known for being director and screenwriter for films such as Crash and Million Dollar Baby, which received an Academy Award for Best Picture. His full, detailed story about his 34-year involvement in Scientology can be read in The New Yorker in an article entitled The Apostate .

There is much to say about this article and I highly recommend people read it. For me, what stood out the most was his statement:

Haggis was struck by another paradox: “Here I was in this very structured organization, but I always thought of myself as a freethinker and an iconoclast.”

I have found this to be true of many people who have been attracted to (and ultimately left) Scientology, myself included. Perhaps I left much earlier than Paul did because my involvement in the Sea Org brought me face-to-face with this contradiction in a way I could no longer deny. It is understandable how it could well take public, paying Scientologists longer to come to grips with this.

Congratulations, Paul and please don't beat yourself up so much about not having seen what was going on earlier. What's important is that you have done so now and rather than leaving quietly as so many have (and I don't blame them either), you have taken courageous action.