Parallel cult leaders, L. Ron Hubbard (left) and Serge Benhayon

The HBO documentary, ‘Going Clear – Scientology and the prison of belief’, has fearlessly exposed the exploitation, bullying and abuses central to the Church of Scientology’s business model. The Australian based Universal Medicine cult is smaller in scale, yet has numerous parallels – a megalomaniacal leader, extra terrestrial mythology, a commercial scheme of graded spiritual advancement, and a sham therapeutic approach based on ‘clearing’ negative ‘energy’.