In Scientology, founder L. Ron Hubbard used the science fiction term space opera to describe what he said were actual extraterrestrial civilizations and alien interventions in past lives. Upon Hubbard's death in 1986, the Church of Scientology announced that he had discarded his physical body and was now "on a planet a galaxy away." It is a basic belief of Scientology that a human being is actually an immortal spiritual being, termed a thetan, that is presently trapped on planet Earth in a "meat body." The thetan has had innumerable past lives and it is accepted in Scientology that lives antedating the thetan's arrival on Earth lived in extraterrestrial cultures.

Descriptions of space opera incidents are seen as nonfiction in the beliefs of Scientology; they appeared in the online Glossary for Dianetics and Scientology, although they were later removed from it. Hubbard said that the modern-day science fiction genre of space opera is merely an unconscious recollection of real events that took place millions of years ago. These events include the story of Xenu, the ruler of the Galactic Confederacy who brought billions of frozen people to Earth 75 million years ago, stacked them around volcanoes and blew them up with hydrogen bombs, creating swarms of disembodied alien souls known as Body Thetans.

Xenu is only one element of Scientologist beliefs in alien civilizations. Such doctrines have existed in Scientology virtually since its beginning: in the 1950s Hubbard wrote and lectured about civilizations such as Helatrobus, Espinol and Arslychus, and in the 1960s he introduced Xenu's Galactic Confederacy. He described repeated instances of their using brainwashing implants on hapless beings.

He also spoke of alien invasions of Earth, such as that carried out around 6235 BC by the Fifth Invader Force, who were "very strange insect-like creature[s] with unthinkably horrible hands."[citation needed]

Similar to 0 things you like: