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The Affiliated New Thought Network, or ANTN, based in La Mesa, California, is an organization of New Thought centers and individuals across the United States and internationally that was founded in 1992. Recognized as a cooperative fellowship, it is an intrafaith organization. [1] Originally for independent Religious Science ministers, today it includes all forms of New Thought organizations and individuals who want to be affiliated. [2]
The organization has a president, vice-president, secretary, treasurer, educational liaison, and general members. Each member is allowed to vote within the organization, as long as they uphold New Thought ideals and beliefs. [3] [4]
One primary tool of ANTN is affirmative prayer. [5] In addition to teaching about New Thought, the ANTN and its members provide support for a number of organizations committed to nonviolence. [6]
The Emerson Theological Institute is partnered with ANTN to provide Religious Studies degrees including bachelors, masters, and doctorates, and certificates for ministers. The Institute is accredited by the Accrediting Commission International for Schools, Colleges and Theological Seminaries. Barbara Marx Hubbard developed her popular "Gateway for Conscious Evolution" while creating a curriculum for the Institute. [7]
The Church of Scientology maintains a wide variety of beliefs and practices. The core belief holds that a human is an immortal, spiritual being (thetan) that is resident in a physical body. The thetan has had innumerable past lives, some of which, preceding the thetan's arrival on Earth, were lived in extraterrestrial cultures. Based on case studies at advanced levels, it is predicted that any Scientologist undergoing auditing will eventually come across and recount a common series of events.
The Christian left is a range of left-wing Christian political and social movements that largely embrace social justice principles and uphold a social doctrine or social gospel.
Drew University is a private university in Madison, New Jersey. Drew has been nicknamed the "University in the Forest" because of its wooded 186-acre (75 ha) campus. As of fall 2020, more than 2,200 students were pursuing degrees at the university's three schools.
In Scientology, the concept of the thetan is similar to the concept of self, or the spirit or soul as found in several belief systems. The term is derived from the Greek letter Θ, theta, which in Scientology beliefs represents "the source of life, or life itself." In Scientology it is believed that it is the thetan, not the central nervous system, which commands the body through communication points.
The Graduate Theological Union (GTU) is a consortium of eight private independent American theological schools and eleven centers and affiliates. Seven of the theological schools are located in Berkeley, California. The GTU was founded in 1962 and their students can take courses at the University of California, Berkeley. Additionally, some of the GTU consortial schools are part of other California universities such as Santa Clara University and California Lutheran University. Most of the GTU consortial schools are located in Berkeley area with the majority north of the campus in a neighborhood known as "Holy Hill" due to the cluster of GTU seminaries and centers located there.
The Religious Technology Center (RTC) is an American non-profit corporation that was founded in 1982 by the Church of Scientology to control and oversee the use of all of the trademarks, symbols and texts of Scientology and Dianetics. Although RTC controls their use, those works are owned by another corporation, the Church of Spiritual Technology which is doing business as L. Ron Hubbard Library, registered in Los Angeles County, California.
Candler School of Theology is one of seven graduate schools at Emory University, located in metropolitan Atlanta, Georgia. A university-based school of theology, Candler educates ministers, scholars of religion and other leaders. It is also one of 13 seminaries affiliated with the United Methodist Church.
The Church of Scientology is a group of interconnected corporate entities and other organizations devoted to the practice, administration and dissemination of Scientology, which is variously defined as a cult, a business or a new religious movement. The movement has been the subject of a number of controversies, and the Church of Scientology has been described by government inquiries, international parliamentary bodies, scholars, law lords, and numerous superior court judgements as both a dangerous cult and a manipulative profit-making business. In 1979, several executives of the organization were convicted and imprisoned for multiple offenses by a U.S. Federal Court. The Church of Scientology itself was convicted of fraud by a French court in 2009, a decision upheld by the supreme Court of Cassation in 2013. The German government classifies Scientology as an anti-constitutional sect. In France, it has been classified as a dangerous cult. In some countries, it has managed to attain legal recognition as a religion.
Louisiana Baptist University (LBU) is a theologically conservative Christian university located in Shreveport, Louisiana.
The Interdenominational Theological Center (ITC) is a consortium of five predominantly African-American denominational Christian seminaries in Atlanta, Georgia, operating together as a professional graduate school of theology. It is the largest free-standing African-American theological school in the United States.
The Hartford International University for Religion and Peace is a private theological university in Hartford, Connecticut.
Starr King School for the Ministry is a Unitarian Universalist seminary in Oakland, California. It is a member of the Graduate Theological Union (GTU) and is affiliated with the University of California, Berkeley. The seminary was formed in 1904 to educate leaders for the growing number of progressive religious communities in the western part of the US. The school emphasizes the practical skills of religious leadership. Today, it educates Unitarian Universalist ministers, religious educators, and spiritual activists, as well as progressive religious leaders from a variety of traditions, including Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Buddhism, earth-centered traditions, and others.
Solihten Institute is a non-profit organization based in Denver, Colorado which manages an international network of faith-based counseling centers that specialize in evidence-based, integrated healing. Counselors and mental health professionals accredited by Solihten Institute receive theological training in addition to typical licensing in psychology, psychiatry and counseling, enabling an approach which combines "mind, body, spirit, and community." Services offered include outpatient counseling, wellness programs, and consultation and training for clergy and other professionals. This is a 12-step organization.
The Church of Scientology publicly classifies itself as a religion, but scholars and other observers regard it as a business, because the organization operates more like a for-profit business than a religious institution. Some scholars of sociology working in religious studies consider it a new religious movement. Overall, as stated by Stephen A. Kent, Scientology can be seen as a "multi-faceted transnational corporation that has religion as only one of its many components. Other components include political aspirations, business ventures, cultural productions, pseudo-medical practices, pseudo-psychiatric claims, and, an alternative family structure."
Various sociological classifications of religious movements have been proposed by scholars. In the sociology of religion, the most widely used classification is the church-sect typology. The typology is differently construed by different sociologists, and various distinctive features have been proposed to characterise churches and sects. On most accounts, the following features are deemed relevant:
Scientology is a set of beliefs and practices invented by American author L. Ron Hubbard, and an associated movement. It has been variously defined as a cult, a business, or a new religious movement. The most recent published census data indicate that there were about 25,000 followers in the United States ; around 2,300 followers in England (2011); and about 1,700 in each of Canada (2011) and Australia (2016). Hubbard initially developed a set of ideas that he called Dianetics, which he represented as a form of therapy. This he promoted through various publications, as well as through the Hubbard Dianetic Research Foundation that he established in 1950. The foundation went bankrupt, and Hubbard lost the rights to his book Dianetics in 1952. He then recharacterized the subject as a religion and renamed it Scientology, retaining the terminology, doctrines, and the practice of "auditing". By 1954, he had regained the rights to Dianetics and retained both subjects under the umbrella of the Church of Scientology.
Freedom of religion in Taiwan is provided for by the Constitution of the Republic of China, which is in force on Taiwan. Taiwan's progressive government generally respects freedom of religion in practice, with policies which contribute to the generally free practice of religion. Taiwan's strong human rights protections, lack of state-sanctioned discrimination, and generally high regard for freedom of religion or belief earned it a joint #1 ranking alongside The Netherlands and Belgium in the 2018 Freedom of Thought Report. Freedom House also gave Taiwan the top score for religious freedoms in 2018. Possibly the only coercion to practice a certain faith in Taiwan comes from within the family, where the choice to adopt a non-traditional faith can sometimes lead to ostracism "because they stop performing ancestor worship rites and rituals."
The history of New Thought started in the 1830s, with roots in the United States and England. As a spiritual movement with roots in metaphysical beliefs, New Thought has helped guide a variety of social changes throughout the 19th, 20th, and into the 21st centuries. Psychologist and philosopher William James labelled New Thought "the religion of healthy-mindedness" in his study on religion and science, The Varieties of Religious Experience.
The Church of Scientology International, Inc. (CSI) is a California 501(c)(3) non-profit corporation. Within the worldwide network of Scientology corporations and entities, CSI is officially referred to as the "mother church" of the Church of Scientology.
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