Thank you, Paul Haggis

I saw that Academy Award wining screenwriter Paul Haggis wrote a letter to Scientology Celebrity Centre International President Tommy Davis, denouncing the cult's homophobia, intolerance and terrible Disconnection and Fair Game Policies, ending it with the announcement that he's resigning from the Scientology.

I posted a reply to him over at Marty Rathbuns blog in response, effectively ending my exile in anonymity from Scientology. I figured that if he could do it, I could too. Here's what I wrote.

Dear Paul,

Thank you for standing up, speaking up and walking away. That took real courage and the repercussions in the Scientology community, & Hollywood itself, are going to be widespread.

Scientology PTS/SP tech & disconnection mandates ruined my family and caused untold heartache – even death. I went along with the protochol, just as I went along with believing I could make a change with keeping scientology working . I thought that was the right thing to do but all the while I was forfeiting my integrity and alienating my family for the ‘greater good’.

Early on I had been made to disconnect from my parents. Later on I found out that my husband Paul Mace

and I
had been alienated from each other, without either of us us recognizing it in time.

By the time I realized what happened, it was too late to repair the situation, as our lives had moved on.

When he died in an accident a few years later, Scientology did nothing but close the folder and ship it into oblivion. The same thing happened with his first wife Judy, who died in an accident 3 months after he did while on the way to the org to do the same program.

In Scientology, death is nothing but a “farewell, see you next time around” affair, and so their orphaned daughter’s cries were met with enforced auditing, of which I am guilty of pushing.

Then Paul’s widow left the church to go to the Freezone. Since being a scientologist meant doing what was right according to the church, no matter what the costs. once again disconnection became yet another wrong solution

At that point it did not matter about family because I’d already disconnected from most, even by default from the ones through death.

I stayed on in the church and did the things that every compliant scientologist does. This went on for years.

Eventually, push came to shove. I finally stood up to Int Management against some out tech and injustices I had been privy to and in a heartbeat the tables were turned. I was now the enemy to be silenced by a threat of no eternity. I admit that when attacked, I cowered but I did not give up the way Int wanted me to. With no apparent recourse, and the refusal to sink to the implied idea of committing suicide, I left quietly and without apparent sorrow. Unfortunately, a shattered life knows no grief at the onset. Like a good robotic scientologist in fear of the dreaded SP label, I quietly moved on, severing scientology ties as I went along, trying to rebuild my live or what was left of it.

It took years before I would venture onto the internet and discover the lies we’d been told, the heartache of others, the corrupt organization which I’d given so many years of my life to. Realizing that I had been as uncaring and callous with disconnecting from my loved ones as the church had been with me, I set about to repair the pain I caused, but disconnection hurts deep and I am still eating crow for my part in it. It’s ok. Lives were ruined and being flippant about it for so long requires that a price be paid. I admire you standing up for your ‘SP’ inlaws but I believe that if you were not as big celebrity as you are, you would would have been labeled PTS and made to do handlings until you did disconnect.

Anyway, I am here to join you in standing up and wearing the once dreaded SP label for the sake of integrity. Your letter here, along with Nancy Many’s courage to publish her new book, have encouraged me to speak up. Thank you!!

I wish you the best in your situation and hope that you are not shunned by those you care about because of your brave decision.

Kathy Mace
ex.KathyMace @ gmail.com

ps: In all the excitement, I failed to acknowledge his Haggis' wife, the talented actress Deborah Rennard.
Congratulations and best wishes to you. Family really is the foundation, no matter what Scientology says.