the region of Miyagi is leading the list of severely affected areas.
More than 200 additional Volunteer Ministers are preparing to leave for Japan to fulfill the demand for help. However more logistical support is needed and there are many more shelter where we can serve.
Please support the activities on the ground by doing the following:
Letter from Onagawa Town Disaster HQ/translation:
24 March 2011
TO: International Scientology Volunteer Disaster Relief
Thank you for the work the Scientology Volunteer Disaster Relief Team is doing at the shelters in Onagawa Town.
I have heard many disaster victims say they feel good, relaxed, relieved from body pain, and healed from the trauma of this disaster after this group delivered the technology called "Assists" developed by L. Ron Hubbard.
The disaster victims were relieved of mental and physical pain and restored to positive thinking, which is the first step for recovery of this town.
I would like others to support this group in creating relief for disaster victims.
Please arrange for this group to work in all areas. We request relief and support actions from this group for Onagawa Town and other cities, towns and villages of this region. This is a very reliable group and they work hard to bring relief in the shelters.
Therefore, I hope that many cities, towns and villages will support them in expanding their activities.
Onagawa Town Disaster HQ
Head of HQ
Along with medical staff and psychologists on the ground in Christchurch, trauma specialists have also arrived to provide stress relief.
Gary Bromwell of the Scientology International Disaster Relief Group is a trauma stress specialist who says he helps victims “come out of the trauma and back into the present so they can rebuild their lives and move on”.
Mr Bromwell uses a variety of techniques including massage.
Watch Mike McRoberts’ interview with Gary Bromwell.
3 News
When assembling model airplanes at age five, Lars Najbjerg was not just playing—he was preparing for his career.
Growing up in the shadow of the Soviet Union in the height of the Cold War, when he was 18 Najbjerg applied to train as a NATO fighter pilot.
“I knew there was more to being a good pilot that physical ability—there was a psychological factor as well,” he says. “Studying everything I could find on the subject, I read Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health and I knew I had found something workable. The book changed my whole attitude.”
Of hundreds of applicants, Najbjerg was one of the five accepted. He completed NATO flight school training at Sheppard Air Force Base in Texas in 1986.
"I've always wanted to test myself—to push myself to the limit,” he says. “As a fighter pilot you learn early on it’s not the airplane that determines your success, it is how well you can cope mentally. Sure, it’s physically demanding to be subjected to pressure nine times stronger than gravity. But the psychological factors are even more important.”
Najbjerg progressed in Scientology, achieving the State of Clear in 1991—a state in which one no longer has his own reactive mind, the hidden source of irrational behavior, unreasonable fears, upsets and insecurities. He describes how the ability he gained made the difference.
"I was testing the spin characteristics of a two-seat aerobatic aircraft. Spinning is a maneuver where the plane is flown out of control, rotating in small circles towards the ground,” he says. “Suddenly, the engine stopped. Instead of reacting with sweaty palms and panic, I analyzed what went wrong and got the engine going. Then I tried the maneuver again. Once more the engine stopped. After several attempts I was able to adjust the engine to correct the problem. I would never have been calm enough to troubleshoot the engine, before I went Clear.”
While he views military defense against the threat of aggression as necessary, he believes that freedom depends on far more fundamental factors.
“War is a social insanity that grows out of ignorance and intolerance,” he says. “It is a terrible solution for lack of one that is more humane. The real challenge is to create a world where we can live together in peace.”
To that end, Najbjerg, 44, devotes his efforts to humanitarian volunteer work. He is chairman of the Humanitarian Association of Denmark, and an active supporter of the Say No To Drugs campaign.
Najbjerg, wife Lisbet, and their five-year-old son Noah live in the town of Them in the Silkeborg municipality on the Jutland peninsula in Denmark. Lisbet, a dentist, also holds a staff position at the Church of Scientology Mission of Silkeborg.
View the Lars Najbjerg video at Scientology.org.
There is a beautiful site called "My Hero"where kids can participate with art work and essays about their heroes.
Karen Farrell is a midwife and a Scientology Volunteer Minister who lives in New England. When she heard about the Haiti earthquake on January 12, her first thought was that she needed to help. Four days later she was in Port-au-Prince with the medical and disaster relief team of doctors and nurses from the Association of Haitian Physicians Abroad, paramedics and Volunteer Ministers who boarded a flight in New York on January 16, chartered by the Church of Scientology to take medical personnel and supplies to Haiti.
Karen was assigned to General Hospital, where the facilities were woefully inadequate for the doctors and nurses working desperately to do something for the worst of the enormous numbers of earthquake victims. Overwhelmed with casualties, the medical staff could scarcely tend to women having babies.
The Norwegian Red Cross had set up a small makeshift obstetric and surgical unit and welcomed the midwife and doctors newly arrived from America.
Karen and a Haitian-American obstetrician from the Association of Haitian Physicians Abroad who arrived on the same flight set up a rudimentary labor and delivery room that Karen described as "archaic" and started moving women in.
After a 12-hour shift, exhausted obstetrics staff started leaving for the night. With no doctor on duty, Karen decided to stay. A fortunate decision. Karen delivered two babies that night.
The first baby was a girl whose mother named her "My Love." The second was born to a 16-year-old first-time mother. Alone, without her family or the father, the young mother was exhausted and terrified. "I held her in my arms for a long time, rocking her," said Karen. "After eight hours, we were finally able to move her to a room with power (yes, we were in the dark all that time). I had to show her how to push and get her to understand me." With the help of a translator, she told the woman, "Be strong and deliver this baby now!"
On another night, six women were in labor, two of them difficult cases. Karen could only hope their babies would hold off until the obstetrics staff came back on duty. Then, as morning dawned, another earthquake struck. Panic swept through the hospital. Some patients, forgetting their limbs had been amputated, tried to stand up and run out. Others who were far too sick to move struggled to get out of bed and out of the building.
"People were screaming and the whole building was shaking," said Karen. The labor room and all the obstetrics patients were in the basement, and Karen knew that if the building collapsed they would all be trapped.
She scrambled with medical students and military personnel to evacuate the patients from the basement and the wards, carrying them outside and placing them on the ground away from the unstable hospital building.
The move was too much for some. A young man died when his oxygen tank was disconnected so he could be moved. The nurse with him went into shock and was unable to function. Karen quickly applied her Volunteer Minister Disaster Response training that orients a person to their immediate surroundings, and the nurse soon snapped out of her shock and said, "OK, we have a lot of work to do," and got back to work moving patients to safety.
Amid the death and destruction, one of the pregnant women started giving birth. Haitian women near the mother-to-be began to sing. When the baby appeared, a doctor shouted, "A baby has been born! There is hope in the world."
Karen was still hoping the two difficult cases would hold off until an obstetrician came back on duty. Just as one woman was about to give birth, her labor slowed and the obstetrician arrived in time and delivered the baby by Caesarian section.
Karen also helped non-obstetrics patients. Many had no family because they were killed or separated in the earthquake, so Karen comforted them.
"Though I don't speak Creole, I could still sit with them and simply listen to them talk. I couldn't understand their words, but I wanted them to know they were not alone.
"One gentleman had so much fear in his eyes. I put my hand on his shoulder and in French I said 'calm.' I just wanted him to know that someone was there. He talked and talked and I nodded my head. I understood enough to know that he was in a lot of pain and was terrified. He thought he was dying, and he was. I got a cold cloth and wiped his face and the back of his neck.
"Everything was in disarray, including the area where the medicine was kept, and the doctors were spending their precious time picking though the medicine trying to find the one the man needed. I told them I would look for it so they could keep treating patients. I finally found it and they gave it to him and he recovered. He made it."
Karen returned home to Boston after a week, to go back to her job. In one week in Haiti she delivered six babies with her own hands and helped with another. She says the experience changed her, and she will never be the same.
Toronto,Canada—The Church of Scientology of Canada recently hosted the 12th annual L. Ron Hubbard Humanitarian Awards honoring six exceptional Canadians for service to the community. More than two hundred guests attended including local and federal officials, police officers, and religious and community leaders. The awards were presented to:
Dr. Ken and Ms. Emily Ng, Chairman and President of the Federation of Chinese Canadians in Markham (FCCM), for providing services to those newly in the country and uniting the Asian community in cooperative social programs.
Ms. Melanie Dickson-Smith, Coordinator of the Church of Scientology’s Drug-Free Marshals program and Civilian Co-Chair of the Toronto Police Services 52 Division Community Police Liaison Committee, for 10 years of community service educating youth on the harmful effects of drugs.
Mr. Zul Kassamali, Vice President of the Association of Progressive Muslims of Canada and President of the Toronto Area Interfaith Council, for fighting intolerance and promoting better conditions for the elderly.
A Lifetime Achievement award was presented posthumously to Mr. Kamil Sadiq, Founder of the Canadian Federation of Intercultural Friendship. Ms. Shamim Sadiq accepted the award honoring her husband’s work to bridge ethnic, racial and religious differences. In 2002, Sadiq received the Queen’s Golden Jubilee Medal, awarded to Canadians for significant contribution to their fellow citizens.
Also receiving the L. Ron Hubbard Humanitarian Award for Lifetime Achievement was York Regional Police Chief Armand La Barge who began his career with York Regional Police in 1973 and has held the position of Chief of Police since December 2002. Crime rates have declined throughout his tenure as Police Chief and York Region has one of the lowest crime rates in North America. In accepting his award, La Barge said, “we have worked very hard to transform the concept of community policing in York Region from one of an officer walking the beat to one in which the community helps shape and assist police in delivering effective community safety, crime prevention and law enforcement programs.”
The L. Ron Hubbard Humanitarian Awards originated in 1999 to honor individuals whose humanitarian achievements make a difference in society. For more information on L. Ron Hubbard visit www.lronhubbard.org.
More than a hundred Scientology Volunteers are in Haiti working with the Scientology Disaster Relief Force. Hard work, but can you imagine anything more rewarding?Before the earthquake there were estimates of over 300,000 orphans in Haiti. There is no way to accurately estimate how many there are now, but it is a tremendous social problem.
The Scientology Volunteer Ministers visit orphanages, bringing food and supplies. Every VM who does so comes back with the same impression--the children of Haiti are amazing. Despite what they have been through they are so resilient, so open and so spiritual. They deserve all possible help.
The 21st Annual Say No to Drugs Holiday Classic 5K, 10K and Children's 1 mile fun-run drew an extensive crowd on December 19th, exceeding all expectations with the number of participants running to forward the message – including myself, a first time 5K runner.
I arrived early, the crisp morning air jolting me out of my weekend sleepiness. I knew the event would be popular, but I did not expect the sea of people assembled in front of the Harborview Center. According to an event coordinator's estimate, 1,700 runners participated this year, 600 more than in previous years – an increase of nearly 55%.
With a final turn-out of nearly twice the number that early-registration figures had suggested, it was understandable that I found myself among the few runners still receiving their numbers even as Hana Li Winters sang the Star Spangled Banner
and a small army of runners waited for Lt. Dimmer of the Pinellas County Sheriff’s Office to blow the starting whistle. Event coordinators Chris Alexander and Sue Minkoff assure me that with this year's experience, they will be fully prepared to handle the enormous crowds next year – including the opportunity to pre-register and receive numbers the day before the race in addition to the morning of.
This being my first race, I paced myself along the course, from the starting line in Coachman Park to the steep incline of the Memorial Causeway leading to Clearwater Beach. Pushing myself up the arch of the Causeway was a challenge; it is no surprise that it features in many other races throughout the year, including both Ironman and Iron Girl. The course doubled back just after the bridge for the 5K runners, while the 10K continued out to the beach.
Participants represented all levels of the running scene: From the professional competitors leading the pack, to amateurs like myself who enjoy running for fun and fitness, to those who chose to walk the course, many coming out just to support the Say No to Drugs theme of the event. I found it to be an excellent race for a first-timer like myself, with a friendly and very supportive field. 
As the first of the 10K runners overtook some of us just rounding the bend on the 5K, words of encouragement met the athlete: “Finish it man! Finish it!”
Crossing the finish line, we were greeted with an all-you-can-eat breakfast of homemade organic spelt pancakes courtesy of volunteers led by Kitty Magness, and complimentary massages from Sun State Massage Academy and adjustments by Family Life Chiropractic – welcome rewards after the morning's exertion.
As the name implies, the Say No to Drugs Holiday Classic aims to raise awareness and spread a drug-free message. At the post-race breakfast in the Harborview Center, children pledged to live their lives drug-free and were sworn in as Drug-Free Marshals by the Youth for a Drug Free Florida, while runners viewed the DVD “The Truth About Drugs” or read the accompanying educational pamphlets.
Nathan Holden from Jacksonville and Melissa Todd from Kansas City won the men's and women's 10K, respectively. Daniel Geilman and Christa Benton of St. Petersburg took the men and women’s 5K races. Awards were also presented to top
finishers in a range of age groups; including 90 year old Jane Bussman of Clearwater, in the 5K.
The Say No to Drugs Holiday Classic was started 21 years ago by world class runner and local resident Sandra Johnson, member of the Dianetics Athletics Association of the Church of Scientology. The idea was to promote an anti-drug message by raising awareness through a road race. From there it has become one of the premier races in the Tampa Bay area.
For more information, including race-times and results, visit www.saynotodrugs.com.
