Leah Remini exposed what she calls the Church Of Scientology’s “Collection Agency” on Episode 7 of Season 3 of her A&E series Scientology and the Aftermath .
Over the past two seasons, Remini and co-host Mike Rinder have shown that the controversial religion is what the official A&E site calls a “pay-as-you-go” organization and they questioned the tactics the church employs to get money from their parishioners to pay for present and future classes.
In this Aftermath special, Remini and Rinder sat down with former Scientologists who shared the different ways they claim they were made to give the church money they couldn’t afford.
Their stories ranged from those who are thousands of dollars in debt to those who were left financially and emotionally bankrupt.
In the episode, a former member of the church alleges it was her “job” to solicit money from parishioners by what she describes as “any means necessary.”
Tony Ortega, who writes the blog The Underground Bunker , revealed in a post regarding the episode that there are members of the organization called “registrars,” or “regges,” whose purpose is to convince parishioners to pay in advance for future courses that could potentially take years to complete, if they are completed at all.
Also featured in the episode was a former Sea Org worker who left the organization and was what Ortega called “saddled” with a “Freeloader’s Debt,” asking him to pay for his job training.
The Sea Org is a Scientology organization, which the Church of Scientology describes as a fraternal religious order comprising the church’s most dedicated members.
Former Scientologist Carol Nyburg spoke of working as a registrar for the Church of Scientology at the Flag Land Base and spoke of how she was told not to take “no” for an answer when it came to getting money for donations and classes from church members.
@MikeRinder and I continue to #FollowTheMoney . All-new #ScientologyTheAftermath tonight at 9pm/8c on @AETV pic.twitter.com/mh60XxhzJ2
— Leah Remini (@LeahRemini) January 8, 2019
“It was your duty to invade people’s privacy,” Nyburg said on the A&E series. “You were taught they have the money. Don’t let them tell you that they don’t.”
Ortega stated on his Twitter account , “Strip away the extreme fundraising and the terror methods of the ‘church’ and what do you have? A quack belief system based on a parlor trick dreamed up by a mediocre science fiction writer who (to himself, anyway) admitted that his goal was to enslave others. Not recommended.”
Scientology and the Aftermath host Mike Rinder responded to Ortega’s tweet by stating the following.
Thank you @TonyOrtega94 for taking the time to expose their bs once again. The depths of slime know no bounds when it comes to scientology. And as always, no response to the substance, just trash their victims with lies. @LeahRemini @AETV #ScientologyTheAftermath https://t.co/y0UeyBtZbh
— Mike Rinder (@MikeRinder) January 9, 2019
The church has responded to Remini and Rinder’s investigative reporting by creating its own website titled Leah Remini Aftermath , where they dispute many of the claims on the television series.
They have posted letters regarding what they call “false information” that Remini and Rinder are stating on the A&E series. You can read their letters here .