French court convicts Scientology of fraud

[Simon_Jester]

Oh, come on. We all know exactly why nobody will ever try to punish the Catholic Church for fraud: they're a popular organization, widely regarded as a beacon of charity, humanity and moral values.

Whether or not it's true doesn't matter at all: nobody's going to try and nail the Church because people would throw a fit, and any government that tried would be voted out of office.

How many times did Church officials claim a miracle? How many times were they prosecuted for obvious fraud when these claims were discredited? None. It's not because it would be difficult (pitifully easy, in fact, in some cases), it's because nobody wants to do it.

I agree; I'm saying that even if the inclination were there, they wouldn't be quite as easy a target as the Church of Scientology, thanks in large part to the fact that they've been smart enough to walk smaller than they used to after outrage at bad church practices started touching off major ground wars in Europe.