History Main / ChurchOfHappyology

You can tell a Happyology-style parody religion from another ParodyReligion by the presence of celebrity characters trampolining on couches, an evil alien overlord, and devices that are sort of like lie detectors being used for counseling sessions. You might also see some of the hyper-specific Orwellian terminology like 'suppressive persons', if a creator [[{{Anvilicious}} thinks subtlety is overrated]].

* ''ComicBook/WonderWomanBlackAndGold'': "Loved Failed" has Wonder Woman villain, Hypnota, using their hypnotic powers to run a cult going by the name of The Guiding Light.

* ''WesternAnimation/BoJackHorseman'': Todd, despondent and looking for a purpose in life, ''almost'' joins Scientology but is persuaded to join the improv club next door instead.

The Church of Scientology has a reputation for being very protective of its public image, and of being extraordinarily sensitive to what it considers defamation. This has been demonstrated by the church breaking out the lawyers to suppress any potential source of mockery by lawsuit, along with private investigators to dig up dirt on them (or in the past, even ''framing'' critics for various crimes).

** Despite the "-ology" name, the Temple of Robotology is more a loose (very loose) parody of Christianity: you promise to be good, and if you don't the Robot Devil takes you to [[IronicHell Robot Hell]], however this didn't stop "[[SockPuppet concerned citizens who weren't Scientologists]]" from complaining. In the DVDCommentary, Matt Groening says he received a call from a Scientologist about it; he apparently just decided to say it was the "church", not the "temple", rather than point out there are no other similarities.
** In "Where No Fan Has Gone Before," there is also the Church of [[Franchise/StarTrek Trek]], with a sign saying "The sci-fi religion that doesn't take all your money."

* Alex Hirsch wanted to do an episode of ''WesternAnimation/GravityFalls'' where Grunkle Stan forms a religion called [[https://i.redd.it/tsg83r93l2l41.jpg Stanetology]]. It never got made because "legal department frowned on this".

** Inarguably the most famous example of taking on Scientology head-on was the season 9 episode "Trapped in the Closet," best remembered for it's long depiction of a key event in Scientology belief, with the caption "[[NotMakingThisUpDisclaimer THIS IS WHAT SCIENTOLOGISTS ACTUALLY BELIEVE.]]" Parodies of Scientologist celebrities like Creator/TomCruise and Creator/JohnTravolta are mocked (though more for the hordy old jokes that they're both deeply closeted). So (in)famous was that episode that a ''Magazine/RollingStone'' magazine article on Parker and Stone featured a picture of them painting graffiti on a Scientology center sign (sadly it was {{Photoshopped}}). It also spawned a meme on Website/FourChan, in which all manner of bizarre photos are captioned with "THIS IS WHAT SCIENTOLOGISTS ACTUALLY BELIEVE."
** A few episodes after "Trapped In The Closet" was "The Return of Chef," made in response to Music/IsaacHayes, voice of Chef (and known Scientologist), ostensibly leaving the show in response to the episode.[[note]]According to Isaac Hayes III, the Church made that decision on this behalf, arguing that after he suffered a debilitating stroke he was not fit to make this decision.[[/note]]. This episode plays the trope a little straighter, with Chef (appearing via [[StylisticSuck low-quality]] [[ManipulativeEditing sentence-mixes]]) getting brainwashed by "The Super Adventure Club" - a child-molesting group who travel the world to do so. It also features [[CallBack a montage depicting a key event in the club's belief, with the caption "THIS IS WHAT THE SUPER ADVENTURE CLUB BELIEVES."]] It ends with Chef [[McLeaned getting killed off]] and Stan calling out "that fruity little club" for what they did to him.
** Prior to this, the trope had been played straight with the Season 5 episode "Super Best Friends," which features the "The Church of Blaintology", though that was intended to mock David Blain much more than Scientology. This was more famously the show's first (and ultimately only successful) visual depiction of The Prophet Muhammed and, unlike later episodes, neither the Church nor Muslim extremists said anything about it.

* ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'': The Movementarians. Devote all your money and labor to them and they will (eventually) take you to Blisstonia, noted for its high level of bliss. It ends with a double subversion. Plus "the Leader" is the spitting image of LRH, and laments "I should have stayed with the Promise Keepers" after the whole cult falls apart. However, the Movementarians also drew from other controversial religious groups, such as the Unification Church (the mass wedding), Osho (the leader driving around in a Rolls Royce), and Heaven's Gate (riding on a spaceship to another planet). Notably, they managed to do this despite Nancy Cartwright, voice of Bart Simpson, being a Scientologist.

* ''Film/BeyondTheBlackRainbow'' is centered around the Arboria Institute, which is basically Scientology [[ThisIsYourPremiseOnDrugs on drugs]]. [[MushroomSamba Lots]][[SurrealHorror and lots]][[MindScrew of drugs]].

* In ''VideoGame/TheSecretWorld'', the Morninglight has shades of this; for example, a "personality test" obviously rigged to tell anyone who takes it that he or she belongs in the Morninglight. Oh, also [[Myth/NorseMythology Loki]] is one of the leaders. And let's not even get into where [[LouCypher the name came from]].
* The Church of the New Dawn in ''VideoGame/WatchDogs2'' is a cult that demands exorbitant amounts of money from its followers, kidnaps members who doubt their teachings (including their celebrity spokesperson) and keeps them in a reeducation camp, and bases its teachings around fake ancient Sumerian tablets. Naturally, since Dedsec is an Anonymous parody you're basically playing through a more violent version of Project Chanology.

* ''Smosh'' has "Religiotology".

* ''TabletopGame/{{Pathfinder}}'' has Razmiran, a country religion, founded by a conman who claimed he passed the test of the starstone. Everything about the country and religion is a rather creepy reflection.

You can tell a Happyology-style parody religion from another ParodyReligion by the presence of celebrity characters trampolining on couches, an evil alien overlord, and devices that are sort of like lie detectors being used for counseling sessions.

You can tell a Happyology-style parody religion from another ParodyReligion by the presence of celebrity characters trampolining on couches, an evil alien overlord, and devices that are sort of like lie detectors being used for counseling sessions. You might also see some of the hyper-specific Orwellian terminology like 'suppressive persons', if a creator [[Anvilicious thinks subtlety is overrated]].

You can tell a Happyology-style parody religion from another ParodyReligion by the presence of celebrity characters trampolining on couches, an evil alien overlord, and devices that are sort of like lie detectors being used for counseling sessions.

* Clive Cussler's ''Plague Ship'' has Responsivists, the big bad organization of the novel. While they don't worship any aliens, they go to great lengths to preserve their public image, react violently to members leaving their movement, and have a lot of Hollywood celebrity endorsement.

** A few episodes after "Trapped In The Closet" was "The Return of Chef," made in response to voice of Chef and known Scientologist Music/IsaacHayes leaving the show, allegedly in protest of "Trapped In The Closet"[[note]]Hayes son later revealed that Hayes did not quit on his own accord. Rather, he'd recently had a debilitating stroke and, not being well enough to make decisions on his own, the Church quit ''for'' him.[[/note]]. This episode plays the trope a little straighter, with Chef (here voiced by [[StylisticSuck deliberately poorly edited archival audio of Hayes]]) getting brainwashed by "The Super Adventure Club" - a child-molesting group who travel the world to do so. It also features [[CallBack a montage depicting a key event in the club's belief, with the caption "THIS IS WHAT THE SUPER ADVENTURE CLUB BELIEVES."]] It ends with Chef [[McLeaned getting killed off]] and Stan calling out "that fruity little club" for what they did to him.

* ''Series/Runaways2017'' (based on the Creator/MarvelComics [[ComicBook/{{Runaways}} series of the same name]]) features The Church of Gibborim, founded by main character Karolina's grandfather (David Ellerh, whose surname may be a nod to Creator/LRonHubbard) and currently headed up by her mother Leslie. A {{Zigzagged}} example in that the alien who inspired the religion is very real [[spoiler:and is Karolina's biological father]], and most of the members are seemingly nice people who genuinely believe they're putting their faith into action for the good of the less fortunate; but the Church is nevertheless shown to be a cult whose leaders seek out the wealthy and famous as members for their influence, while abusing their power to entrap,[[spoiler:murder and consume]] the impoverished and homeless teenagers their charity takes in. It's later shown that the Church has a habit of "reconditioning" members, and a facility dedicated to such is even called "The Crater" (likely a reference to the trope non-namer's infamous [[Room101 The Hole facility]]).

* ''Series/TheArrangement'' centers around the Institute of the Higher Mind. The titular arrangement is the marriage of IHM member and superstar movie actor Kyle West and unknown actress Megan Morrison.

* The Wiki/SCPFoundation has the [[http://www.scp-wiki.net/groups-of-interest#toc6 Fifth Church]], who once [[http://www.scp-wiki.net/scp-1425 almost destroyed reality with a self-help book]].

* ''Series/SchittsCreek'': In Season 6, Alexis convinces Stevie, Ronnie, Jocelyn and Twyla to take an exercise class called Elevation that turns out to be a thinly disguised pyramid scheme and cult that is training its member to elevate to a gateway and rendezvous with a UFO.

* Season 2 of ''Series/TheBoys'' introduces the "Church of the Collective," which seems to have traits in common, including a hatred of therapists, and processes seemingly designed to gain blackmail information from new recruits. The Deep ends up joining early on in the season, as a consequence of his Main/HumiliationConga in the previous season.

* Music/DemonHunter's ''[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3yNJ8Uc4Pls Science of Lies]]''.
* Music/FrankZappa had the Church of Appliantology led by L. Ron Hoover in ''[[Music/JoesGarage Joe's Garage]]''.
* Played with in [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VWNA-jJNhos Flyentology]].

%% ''WesternAnimation/{{Superjail}}'' devoted an entire episode, "Don't Be A Negaton", to a space cult with a striking resemblance to Scientology. (ZeroContextExample: What resemblance?) Many of the references though were just obscure enough that only those familiar with Scientology would get the joke.

%% The trope is played straight with the Season 5 episode "Super Best Friends". Their depiction of "The Church of Blaintology", though obviously making fun of David Blaine, has a few ''very'' accurate jabs (ZeroContextExample: What are the jabs?) at Scientology, in addition to sneaking a visual representation of The Prophet onto the screen.
** Several seasons later, ''South Park'' attacked the religion head-on, by name, in the episode "Trapped in the Closet". This episode included several famous Scientologists ([[Creator/TomCruise one of whom]] threatened Stan with "I'll sue you in England!"). The episode also included a depiction of a key event in Scientology belief, with the caption "[[NotMakingThisUpDisclaimer THIS IS WHAT SCIENTOLOGISTS ACTUALLY BELIEVE.]]"
** Several episodes after "Trapped In The Closet", after Scientologist Isaac Hayes said he was quitting (not because of the Scientology episode, he claimed, but because of the show's "general disrespect for religion" - which had never bothered him in the previous seasons), they did an episode where Chef was brainwashed by the "[[http://www.southparkstudios.com/full-episodes/s10e01-the-return-of-chef Super Adventure Club]]" - a child-molesting group who travel the world to do so and parody the episode mentioned above. Then he was promptly McLeaned. Er...he was McLeaned right ''before'' this episode, apologies.
** And yet, much like the unobscured depiction of Muhammed was ignored by Muslims (unlike when a European newspaper depicted him a few years later), there was no response from Scientologists to "Super Best Friends".
** Inevitably, the ''South Park'' episode spawned a new meme on Website/FourChan, in which all manner of bizarre photos are captioned with "THIS IS WHAT SCIENTOLOGISTS ACTUALLY BELIEVE."
** So (in)famous was that episode that a ''Magazine/RollingStone'' magazine article on Parker and Stone featured a picture of them painting graffiti on a Scientology center sign (sadly it was {{Photoshopped}}).

* [[http://www.epsilonprogram.com/ The Epsilon Program]] in the ''VideoGame/GrandTheftAuto'' series. In the words of their leader Cris Formage, they're not a cult but "a fellowship of like-minded adults who tithe money in exchange for salvation and merit badges", and their success may be partially attributed to their leader's charismatic, Creator/JamesEarlJones-esque voice. Their headquarters is located in the UsefulNotes/CaymanIslands (a [[SwissBankAccount notorious tax shelter]]), and their holy text, the Epsilon Tract, has never even been written. They were first introduced in ''[[VideoGame/GrandTheftAutoSanAndreas San Andreas]]'' on [[Radio/GTARadio Lazlow's radio talk show]], where Formage is interviewed alongside another self-help huckster, Darius Fontaine. ''[[VideoGame/GrandTheftAutoIV GTA IV]]'' also features Brandon Roberts, an Epsilonist and [[ThePrimaDonna egotistical actor]] who is interviewed on Public Liberty Radio in a parody of Creator/TomCruise's incoherent interviews; while he never mentions the Epsilon Program by name, he does toss out a "Kifflom", their go-to greeting. ''VideoGame/GrandTheftAutoV'' has an entire sidequest in which Michael joins the Epsilon Program, allowing a deeper insight into the cult than ever before: they convert you from an "antithesis" to a "thesis" through illicit favors, inane brainwashing rituals, and ''hefty'' donations (starting at $500 and escalating to $50,000). Conversely, people who are looked down upon are referred to as "Objectionable Persons". The real kicker, however, comes in ''GTA Online'', where we get the ultimate look at just how much of a CrapsackWorld the ''GTA'' universe really is: [[spoiler:the first time you get killed, you find out that Cris Formage really ''does'' have magical powers, which he uses to resurrect you [[GameplayAndStoryIntegration (which explains how respawns and Passive Mode work)]] while gloating about both his sexual conquests and how all the naysayers were wrong]]. In other words, in the ''GTA'' universe, the one true faith is an exploitative weirdo cult.

* ''Series/BrooklynNineNine'': In Season 5, Jake accidentally signs himself up to [=NutriBoom=], a clear Pyramid Scheme[[note]]Well, [[InsistentTerminology a conical-tiered, multi-flow-through medical marketing entity]][[/note]]. When he tries to cancel it, it turns out that not only it is impossible to leave without paying $10,000, the inner circle of the company is a cult-of-personality slavishly devoted to their CEO. The CEO's wife has been missing for a while and members are required to sign a statement asserting that she is definitely alive and happy, which [[BlatantLies in no way resembles]] questions about the welfare and current whereabouts of Shelly Miscavige. [[spoiler: In the show, the CEO's wife really is alive and happy - she's the one actually running the whole con from behind the scenes, at least until Jake and Charles stumble on the truth.]]