INTERNET AND SCIENTOLOGY - AUDITING

The central religious practice of Scientology is auditing (from Latin audire, "to listen"), which is a precise form of spiritual counseling between a Scientology minister and a parishioner.

It is readily apparent that, in many respects, man's efforts fall short of the ideal of infinite spiritual survival. He has lost sight of the Supreme Being, lost awareness of his own spiritual nature and, in most cases, forgotten that life requires successful participation in all eight dynamics. Rather than playing his part in the conquest of the physical universe, he suffers failures, to a greater or lesser degree, resulting in pain, unconsciousness and unwillingness to face the challenge of existence.

In the course of an average life as man, the thetan is certain to encounter many experiences that can reduce his level of spiritual awareness. Over the course of many lifetimes, he may entirely lose sight of his true nature, and with that fall from spirituality, the level and quality of his participation in all eight dynamics is diminished.

Auditing reverses this decline. It enables the being to cast off the spiritual chains that grow heavier from lifetime to lifetime — the accumulation of his pains and misfortunes, confusions and his own moral transgressions.

Just as these experiences bring about his fall from spiritual awareness, trapping and enmeshing him in the material universe, auditing provides the route to spiritual salvation by restoring the thetan’s full awareness of his essential identity and abilities.

The practice of auditing was developed from the understanding of the fundamental laws of life contained in the Scientology Axioms. It is based on the principle that only the truth can set one free, and it enables the person to come to terms with the truth of his own existence — past, present and future. Through auditing, the person regains an understanding of and responsibility for his relationship to all of life and the Supreme Being. With full spiritual awareness and responsibility restored comes complete spiritual freedom — Scientology’s spiritual salvation.

During auditing, a person can have many realizations about life. By honestly looking at the factors which have inhibited his spiritual growth, he is able to overcome them and experience a true spiritual resurgence. When auditing is understood as a spiritual practice that incorporates the theta- MEST theory and the concept of the eight dynamics, it is apparent that increased spiritual awareness brings about greater responsibility and participation as regards one’s family, one’s group and all the other dynamics, including the Supreme Being.

HOW AN AUDITING SESSION IS CONDUCTED

In auditing, the minister, or auditor (“one who listens”) asks the parishioner a series of specific questions in the area of spiritual travail being addressed in that particular session. Once the auditor locates the area of spiritual trauma, he will ask further specific questions or give directions needed to help the parishioner address and come to grips with that incident, experience or area of life.

The minister does not offer any “advice” to the parishioner. One of the essential principles of Scientology is that an individual can advance spiritually only if he is allowed to find his own answers to life’s problems. This is accomplished by helping one to examine his own existence and improve his ability to face what he is and where he is — peeling away the layers of experience that have weighed so heavily upon him.

THE ROLE OF COMMUNICATION IN AUDITING

The brilliance preceding great discoveries is often the insight which posed the right question — perhaps one so “obvious” it never occurred to anyone to ask. Newton may have “discovered” gravity only because he was the first to question why all bodies fall to the Earth.

In a similar way, but in the spiritual realm, auditing leads to personal revela- tion by posing precise questions based on the Scientology cosmology. In seeking for his answer, the parishioner discovers intrinsic truths abou t life and the underlying factors of existence which transcend the physical universe.

Yet there is another factor in auditing which is even more important: the role of communication itself.

Communication is in deed necessary to all aspects of life; but the understanding of communication in Scientology goes far beyond any ordinary concept of the commonplace exchange of ideas in social intercourse.

One of the Axioms of Scientology, Axiom 28, presents the fundamental principle of communication , and a substantial portion of Scientology Scripture is devoted to its application in auditing. In fact, audit' mg and spiritual salvation through Scientology practices only become possible through the proper application of communication as defined in Axiom 28.

Through communication on, the auditor directs the parishioners r ’s attention to confront aspects of his existence to find the answers to auditing n g questions, erase the harmful mental a and spiritual energy in which the thetan is enmeshed, and thus experience experience relief from spiritual travail.

This precise process of communication, as practiced in auditing, is essential for one to come to a complete understanding of life. As discussed in Chapter 2, understanding exists to the degree that one can have affinity for something, can perceive or experience its reality, and can communicate with it or about it. The precision of communication in auditing therefore plays a direct role in raising a person’s understanding and spiritual state.

THE ELECTROPSYCHOMETER — AN AID TO AUDITING

Most auditors use a special electropsychometer — called an “E-meter” — to assist them in helping parishioners address experiences which lie at the root of spiritual travail. (Electro-psych-ometer, from electrometer: a calibrated device used for measuring extremely low voltages, and psyche: the human soul, spirit or mind.) This religious instrument is vital because the mental image pictures that harbor these experiences also hold very minute amounts of electrical energy that can be detected with the E-meter. As this charge varies or dissipates, the auditor knows the parishioner has successfully addressed — and resolved — the source of that aspect of his spiritual entrapment. Thus, while the Emeter by itself does nothing, it is an invaluable guide for the auditor.

HIGHER STATES OF EXISTENCE

Auditing ranges from very simple and basic to more searching and intensive religious experiences as one participates in further and higher level services. Auditing enables an individual to achieve the spiritual state of Clear. In this state the individual is no longer trapped by the prior traumas recorded on his time track and is capable of living a rational, more spiritual existence.

Beyond Clear, one attains higher states of awareness called Operating Thetan. In this spiritual state it is possible for the thetan to possess complete spiritual ability, freedom, independence and serenity, to be freed from the endless cycle of birth and death, and to have full awareness and ability independent of the body.

The Advanced Levels of auditing employ a special auditing procedure which the individual conducts alone; the person acts as his own auditor, alternately posing precise questions and then seeking their answers.

These levels deal with the highest truths of existence. The ability to conduct “solo” auditing presupposes a thorough and intimate knowledge of all fundamental Axioms and principles of Scientology. The Advanced Levels therefore appear at the very top of the Bridge to Total Freedom and are open to those who have completed the lower training and auditing levels necessary for full understanding of these advanced procedures. These individuals are not only spiritually prepared but are required to meet high ethical standards.