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by L. Ron Hubbard

An early 20th-century philosopher spoke of the impending decline of the West. What he failed to predict was that the West would export its culture to the rest of the world and thus grip the entire world in its death throes.

Today we are witnessing that decline and since we are involved in it, it is of utmost importance to us. At stake are whether the ideals we cherish will survive or some new abhorrent set of values win the day.

These are not idle statements. We are today at a watershed of history and our actions today will decide whether the world goes up from here or continues to slide into some new dark age.

It is important to understand bad conditions don't just happen. The cultural decay we see around us isn't haphazard. It was caused. Unless one understands this he won't be able to defend himself or reach out into the society with effectiveness. A society is capable of surviving for thousands of years unless it is attacked from within or without by hostile forces. Where such an attack occurs, primary targets are its religious and national gods and heroes, its potential of leadership and the self-respect and integrity of its members.

Material points of attack are finance, communications, technology and a denial of resources.

Look around today and you will find countless examples of these points. They scream at us every day from the newspapers.

Probably the most critical point of attack on a culture is its religious experience. Where one can destroy or undermine religious institutions then the entire fabric of the society can be quickly subverted or brought to ruin.

Religion is the first sense of community. Your sense of community occurs by reason of mutual experience with others. Where the religious sense of community and with it real trust and integrity can be destroyed then that society is like a sand castle unable to defend itself against the inexorable sea.

For the last hundred years or so religion has been beset with a relentless attack. You have been told it's the "opiate of the masses," that it's unscientific, that it is primitive; in short, that it is a delusion.

But beneath all these attacks on organized religion there was a more fundamental target: the spirituality of man, your own basic spiritual nature, self-respect and peace of mind. This black propaganda may have been so successful that maybe you no longer believe you have a spiritual nature but I assure you you do.

In fact, you don't have a soul, you are your own soul. In other words, you are not this book, your social security card, your body or your mind. You are you.

Convince a man that he is an animal, that his own dignity and self-respect are delusions, that there is no "beyond" to aspire to, no higher potential self to achieve, and you have a slave. Let a man know he is himself, a spiritual being, that he is capable of the power of choice and has the right to aspire to greater wisdom and you have started him up a higher road.

Of course, such attacks on religion run counter to man's traditional aspirations to spiritual fulfillment and an ethical way of life.

For thousands of years on this planet thinking man has upheld his own spirituality and considered the ultimate wisdom to be spiritual enlightenment.

The new radical thought that man is an animal without a spiritual nature has a name: totalitarian materialism. Materialism is the doctrine that "only matter matters." The apostles of this new thought are trying to sell everybody on the idea that people really down deep are just a mass and what the person wants to do is cohese with this mass and then be protected by the mass.

This philosophical position was very handy to militaristic and totalitarian governments and their advocates of the last hundred years who wished to justify their atrocities and subjugation of populaces.

One of the tricks of the game has been to attack religion as unscientific. Yet science itself is merely a tool by which the physical universe can be better controlled. The joke is that science itself can become a religion.

Gerhard Lenski on page 331 of his The Religious Factor, a Sociologist's Inquiry, defines religion as "a system of beliefs about the nature of force(s), ultimately shaping man's destiny, and the practices associated therewith, shared by members of a group."

Scientific activities can be as fanatical as religious ones. Scientific groups can themselves be religious "orthodox science" monopolies. The Einsteinian concept of space and time can itself become a holy writ, just as Aristotle's writings were converted into dogmas by the orthodoxy to squash any new ideas in the Middle Ages. (Einstein himself until late in his life was looked upon as a maverick and denied admittance into learned societies.)

Science in itself can become a new faith, a brave new way of overcoming anxiety by explaining things so there is no fear of God or the hereafter.

Thus science and religion are not a dichotomy (pair of opposites). Science itself was borrowed from ancient religious studies in India and Egypt.

Let a man know he is himself, a spiritual being, that he is capable of the power of choice and has the right to aspire to greater wisdom and you have started him up a higher road.

Religion has also been attacked as primitive. Too much study of primitive cultures may lead one to believe religion is primitive as it is so dominant in them and that "modern" cultures can dispense with it. The truth of the matter is that at no time is religion more necessary as a civilizing force than in the presence of huge forces in the hands of man, who may have become very lacking in social abilities emphasized in religion.

The great religious civilizing forces of the past, Buddhism, Judaism, Christianity, and others, have all emphasized differentiation of good from evil and higher ethical values.

The lowering of church attendance in the United States coincided with a rise in pornography and general immorality, and an increase in crime which then caused a rise in numbers of police without a subsequent decline in actual moral aberration.

When religion is not influential in a society or has ceased to be, the state inherits the entire burden of public morality, crime and intolerance. It then must use punishment and police. Yet this is unsuccessful as morality, integrity and self-respect not already inherent in the individual, cannot be enforced with any great success. Only by a spiritual awareness and inculcation of the spiritual value of these attributes can they come about. There must be more reason and more emotional motivation to be moral, etc., than threat of human discipline.

When a culture has fallen totally away from spiritual pursuits into materialism, one must begin by demonstrating they are each a soul, not a material animal. From this realization of their own religious nature individuals can again come to an awareness of God and become more themselves.

Medicine, psychiatry and psychology "solved" the whole problem of "human nature" simply by dumping it into the classification of material nature-body, brain, force. As they politically insist on monopoly and use social and political propaganda to enforce their monopoly, they debar actual search for real answers to human nature.

When religion is not influential in a society or has ceased to be, the state inherits the entire burden of public morality, crime and intolerance. It then must use punishment and police. Yet this is unsuccessful as morality, integrity and self-respect not already inherent in the individual, cannot be enforced with any great success.

Their failures are attested by lack of result in the field of human nature. They cannot change man-they can only degrade. While asserting dominance in the field of human nature they cannot demonstrate results-and nowhere do they demonstrate that lack more than in their own persons. They have the highest suicide rate and prefer the use of force on others. Under their tutelage the crime rate and antisocial forces have risen. But they are most condemned by their attacks on anyone who seeks answers and upon the civilizing influences of religion.

Of course, if one is going to find fault with something, it implies that he wishes to do something about it and would if he could. If one does not like the crime, cruelty, injustice and violence of this society, he can do something about it. He can become a VOLUNTEER MINISTER and help civilize it, bring it conscience and kindness and love and freedom from travail by instilling into it trust, decency, honesty and tolerance.

Briefly, a Volunteer Minister fulfills the definition of religion in this increasingly cynical and hopeless world.

Let's look again at the definition of religion.

In a few words, religion can be defined as belief in spiritual beings. More broadly, religion can be defined as a system of beliefs and practices by means of which a group of people struggles with the ultimate problems of human life. The quality of being religious implies two things: first, a belief that evil, pain, bewilderment and injustice are fundamental facts of existence; second, a set of practices and related sanctified beliefs that express a conviction that man can ultimately be saved from those facts.*

Thus, a Volunteer Minister is a person who helps his fellow man on a volunteer basis by restoring purpose, truth and spiritual values to the lives of others.

A Volunteer Minister does not shut his eyes to the pain, evil and injustice of existence. Rather, he is trained to handle these things and help others achieve relief from them and new personal strength as well.

How does a Volunteer Minister accomplish these miracles? Basically, he uses the technology of Scientology to change conditions for the better-for himself, his family, his groups, friends, associates and for mankind.

A society to survive well, needs at least as many Volunteer Ministers as it has policemen. A society gets what it concentrates upon. By concentrating on spiritual values instead of criminality a new day may yet dawn for man.

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It is important to understand bad conditions don't just happen. The cultural decay we see around us isn't haphazard. It was caused. Unless one understands this he won't be able to defend himself or reach out into the society with effectiveness.

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American Identity

In 2014, if you were to ask the average person on the street in New York City to identify who they are, you might hear a variety of different answers. Some might answer with their race or gender, or some may say simply that they are Americans. In fact, it is very common today for people in the United States to think of themselves first and foremost as Americans. However, in the early part of the 19th century, that was not necessarily the case. Let's learn more about American identity in the early part of the 1800s.

Regional Identities

Before the United States existed, citizens of the British colonies thought of themselves primarily as British subjects. In fact, many historians have argued that the American Revolution was an attempt by some to reassert their rights under the British crown. However, once the break with Britain was made, a new national identity was formed. This identity did not focus solely on the United States, though.

Many saw themselves first and foremost as citizens of the states in which they lived. Individuals associated themselves with their local surroundings because the young country had not yet been linked together as a strong national unit despite having overcome the difficulties of the revolution. To be sure, Americans still loved their country and appreciated their national independence, but many still associated their identity with their particular state. For example, a farmer from Georgia might identify himself first and foremost as a Georgian, meaning that his allegiances would be with his state and then with the federal government in Washington, D.C.

Political Identity

This regional identity extended to politics in many ways. Early American history saw the formation of political parties, which were largely based on regional identities, issues, and desires. For example, the Federalist Party, which had members such as John Adams and Alexander Hamilton, was largely located in the Northeastern part of the country. The Federalists favored a stronger federal government that supported a national banking and economic system. They sought to maintain and develop strong ties with Europe, especially Great Britain. This was driven largely by the need of the shipping industry in the Northeast and New England, which drew strength from trade with the British.

When the War of 1812 began, many in New England were strongly against it. In fact, there were rumblings of peace movements and even secession from the rest of the country. The 1814-1815 Hartford Convention saw delegates from across New England discuss their grievances regarding the war, with some extremists even advocating secession. With the war's conclusion in 1815, these Federalists were largely discredited, and the Federalist Party fell apart and never again competed for national office. During the first years of the 19th century, however, many in the Northeast identified with the Federalists for regional and political reasons.

In the Southern United States, the Democratic-Republican Party was much more popular. It was the political party founded by Jefferson, clinging to his ideals of republican government that were more focused on the needs of the states and of an agrarian country. Adherents of this party were generally against the national debt and the national bank. Following the War of 1812, the Democratic-Republicans became the only national political party, and it dominated national politics until splitting apart into four groups in the 1820s, some of which were influenced by various regional political differences.

Religious Identity

For many early Americans, religion was another strong factor influencing their personal identity. The vast majority of Americans in the early 19th century were of a Protestant background. This crossed ethnic boundaries, meaning that Germans, British, Dutch, and other groups all shared similar traits.

Catholics and Jews were present in the United States at this time, but they were not nearly as prevalent as Protestants. Most colonies had been established by particular groups, meaning that various states had backgrounds in particular denominations. For example, Maryland was established by Catholics in the 1600s, and thus, many citizens of Maryland remained Catholic in the 1700s and 1800s. Other states, such as Virginia, were heavily Anglican. In Pennsylvania, there was a large Quaker population, impacting the religious and cultural identity of many within that powerful mid-Atlantic state.

While many colonies were created with established churches (the official church of that colony's government), there was no established church of the new United States government. Some states kept their established churches into the 1800s, but by the middle of the 19th century, separation of church and state had taken effect on the state level as well. Thus, many Americans identified themselves with a particular religious denomination, but it was generally not influenced by the state in the early years of the 19th century.

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religious & personal identity in the early 19th century - video & lesson transcript | study.com

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American Political, Religious & Personal Identity in the Early 19th Century - Video & Lesson Transcript | Study.com

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In 2014, if you were to ask the average person on the street in New York City to identify who they are, you might hear a variety of different answers. Some might answer with their race or gender, or some may say simply that they are Americans.

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The church shapes society and politics.pptx