Waving the Olympic flag in Paris, the cult’s star made the world forget about the unpleasant bits
Around 75m years since a mighty intergalactic leader somehow triggered the existence of today’s Scientologists, the interests of their religion and the rest of humanity seem finally to have aligned: in shared devotion to Tom Cruise.
After Cruise leapt into the Olympics closing ceremony to pick up a flag that he took – once he had been hailed by dazzled elite athletes – via motorbike, plane and parachute to LA’s Hollywood sign, both his feats and his casting were hailed as inspired. You would never have known from unstinting appreciations acknowledging him as the best loved, the bravest, most revered star in the world, that Cruise has been long and widely considered too senior a Scientologist to be unconditionally admired or, given the reported mischiefs of that organisation, much tolerated.
