Volunteer Ministers and the Help They Provide

The Scientology Handbook is the textbook of the Scientology Volunteer Ministers and free courses based on this book, which was compiled from texts written by L. Ron Hubbard are available online.

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Scientology Volunteer Minister David Dempster, a Scotsman who has lived in Clearwater, Florida for the past four years, was on the first Scientology-sponsored charter flight to Haiti on January 16, departing from JFK Airport in New York. The aircraft transported more than 100 doctors, nurses and EMTs (emergency medical technicians) to Haiti, and a team of Volunteer Ministers to support them in their work. Five more flights sponsored by Scientologists have provided transport for over 600 medical and support personnel on donated planes from New York, Los Angeles and Miami. Dempster, who provided urgently needed administrative backup to doctors at two Port-au-Prince hospitals, is back in Florida now, and reflects on his experiences there.

Dempster was first deployed to General Hospital in Port-au-Prince. “On our drive to the hospital, the physical destruction we saw was staggering,” he said. “A local resident told me most buildings are made of concrete blocks to safeguard against hurricane damage, but this served them badly in the quake. The damage was exacerbated by the common practice of mixing extra sand in the concrete to save money. Because of this, the walls just crumbled in the earthquake.”

At General Hospital, Dempster’s team provided administrative backup to the doctors and nurses on duty. “Our Volunteer Ministers organized incoming medical supplies, helped calm distressed patients, distributed water to patients, carried stretchers, helped deliver babies and assisted with amputations, of which there were many,” he said.

“We had a team of four or five Volunteer Ministers assisting the doctor who ran the Intensive Care Unit during the day and two Volunteer Ministers who took on overnight duty. This made an enormous difference in the quality of patient care.”

Dempster also worked at the University of Miami tent hospital. Medical staff had arrived in Haiti, but with no administrative personnel to support them. This tied up the doctors, nurses and EMTs in administrative and logistics functions, drastically cutting into their patient care. To free up the doctors and nurses, the Volunteer Ministers took over myriad administrative support functions.

Organization of medical supplies was the first critical need. Donated supplies had been dropped off, unsorted and unlabeled, forming mountains of boxes, and the scene was consuming precious hours of doctors’ and nurses’ time trying to find a particular medication, a clamp or a syringe. The Volunteer Ministers attacked the disarray of the supply tent, sorting and stacking, organizing and labeling, and setting up a distribution line to get needed items to medical personnel rapidly. This handling of the supply tent by the Scientology Volunteer Ministers enabled the doctors and nurses to spend their time treating patients, with many lives saved as a direct result.

Another area of enormous need was the organizing and running of triage—registering incoming patients, giving them wristband IDs, and noting their visible injuries so doctors and nurses could more rapidly assess priorities. Dempster was put in charge of the Volunteer Ministers in this area, replacing a nurse who had been doing this. “She was very relieved to be able to get on with actual nursing duties,” he said, “while we Volunteer Ministers took care of administrative and logistics matters.”

Back in Florida, Dempster says the work still to be done is massive and he encourages others to volunteer.

To learn more, visit the Volunteer Ministers blog at blog.volunteerministers.org

Labels: haiti, L. Ron Hubbard, Scientology Handbook, Scientology Volunteer Minister, Scientology Volunteer Ministers, volunteerministers

The Scientology Volunteer Ministers Eastern European Goodwill Tour is in Košice, in the Slovak Republic. The Slovak Republic is one of the more recent nations to join the EU, and they had a hard time coming up to the economic bottom line required for entry. When I was last over in Europe and we were driving to Hungary we were advised to steer clear of Slovakia because of higher crime rate there than in other nearby countries. We had to jerrymander our way around to avoid it. But obviously if it affects tourists badly it must be a real problem to natives.

The Goodwill Tour is a really good idea for that area. The courses are free or very inexpensive. Second. And the Scientology Handbook booklets have now been translated into Slovakian.

I've heard from some of the people who did courses or seminars when the Tour was in Romania and Poland that the VMs inspired them to set up their own VM groups. So that's another great reason.

A few years down the road when we hear about the "Church of Scientology of Košice I'll remember reading about this.

Labels: Scientology Handbook, Scientology Volunteer Minister, Slovakia

There are many very dedicated and well-meaning volunteers, and our world would be a sad and barren place without them.

But the volunteers who are most valuable are those who are trained and really help others.

There are Doctors Without Borders and engineers and construction professionals who volunteer their time in war zones, disaster areas, and 3rd World countries.

But you don't have to have years of training, a trade union membership or a degree. In fact with just a bit of study of the Scientology Handbook anyone can improve his/her value as a volunteer and provide real help to people

Labels: Scientology Handbook, volunteers

The Scientology Volunteer Ministers who flew to Pisco to help in the aftermath of last month's earthquake did such a good job there. The administrative technology covered in the Scientology Handbook by L. Ron Hubbard is of enormous help in these kinds of situations. When the local infrastructure breaks down and people are not only confronted by the loss of their homes, their friends and family members, their livelihoods, their possessions and on top of that they are living in shelters with limited food and water and no privacy, it is a real help to have people who know how to organize the place, how to administer basic trauma relief, and how to put people to work, cleaning, serving and helping one another.

The team of VMs in Pisco included several veterans of other disasters and they were able to simply step in and take control of the shelters in Pisco, the town hardest hit by the earthquake.

This photo shows two of the VMs administering Scientology assists to emergency relief personnel.

In a recent international Scientology event David Miscavige described Volunteer Ministers as people who give unconditional help. It's really true, and Pisco was a real example of this.

I just had the opportunity to speak to two of the volunteers who left within 2 days of the disaster and only returned home this week. They both described the month they were in Peru as one of the most incredible experiences of their lives. They were getting hardly any sleep; they were living in the same terrible conditions that the victims of the disaster were living in; they experienced the death and loss firsthand. But the fact that they were able to really help people will remain with them the rest of their lives as one of the most important things they have ever done.

Labels: David Miscavige, disaster relief, Earthquake, L. Ron Hubbard, Peru, Pisco, Scientology Handbook, Scientology Volunteer Minister

There is a team of Volunteer Ministers who have been in Peru for most of the past month helping the survivors of the 7.9 earthquake.

If you can help with donations, or join the relief effort, contact the Volunteer Ministers Consultant at vm@volunteerministers.org

Or if you can volunteer your time they will train you, using the Scientology Handbook, and see that you get the help you need to succeed as a VM.

Labels: Peru, Scientology Handbook, Scientology Volunteer Minister