NEW YORK, USA - Among tired firefighters, haggard police and
military rescue personnel, a group of volunteers stood out in bright yellow
T-shirts whose large lettering announced them as "Scientology Volunteer
Ministers." More than 800, from Queens to Glendale, Seattle to
Miami, showed up ready to help.
"Everyone was working together with one common purpose," said
Volunteer Minister Doug Carter, 49, who drove 24 hours from Miami to help.
"The attitude was total determination to get the job done."
Volunteers from many faiths worked shoulder-to-shoulder on arduous support tasks
from delivering food, clothing and water to searching the rubble for survivors.
As exhausted fire, police and rescue workers took breaks, Scientology
Volunteer Ministers started delivering "assists," developed by L. Ron
Hubbard from his discoveries in Dianetics.
Some workers were physically sickened, others emotionally stunned and
susceptible to injury among torn metal and heavy machinery. Assists bring
an injured or dazed person back into communication with his surroundings.
They can be learned in half an hour and work well in conjunction with
medical care. They helped hundreds at the disaster site.
Army Emergency Medical Technician Frank Fasano, 43, a decorated Gulf War hero
working at ground zero, received an assist. He later applauded the assist's
benefits and said, "I understand how it works, but it's knowing that
people care. I've been telling everyone about you." Fasano learned
to give assists and began helping others.
New York City fire and police personnel, having spent 12-hour shifts on
"the pile," as the main wreckage site is called, were grateful to get
relief for their battered bodies. Carter recalled one policeman with an
injured leg. He got an assist for five minutes and afterward exclaimed,
"Oh, my God, it works!" He went right back to work.
Rev. John Carmichael, president of the Church of Scientology of New York, tells
of a skeptical physical therapist who learned assists and was amazed to see an
injured child's pain disappear so quickly. She gave another assist to a
woman who was walking painfully, bent over and disoriented without her cane.
Both were surprised when the woman felt better and walked briskly away, no cane
needed.
Several college students came to help but doubted anything could be effective.
They found the assists amazingly workable and spent many hours bringing
relief.
When asked why volunteer ministers would work so hard, Rev. Carmichael quoted
an L. Ron Hubbard maxim, "A being is only as valuable as he can serve
others." Dianetics assists and training are available at Scientology
Churches worldwide.