Tom Cruise: Apparently the New Messiah

Tom Cruise has always had a bit of an inflated ego hasn't he? When he's not telling women how to deal with their post-partum depression, he's arrogantly discounting the entire school of psychology as 'glib'. But the size of Tom Cruise's self opinion has reached such an all time high that scientist are speculating that Global Warming is actually caused by the dangerous gravitational pull of his giant oversized head. You see, accordng to The Church of Scientology, Tom Cruise now believes that he is Jesus Christ.

Long considered just "some stupid science fiction cult", it has taken a lot of special back massages at natural disasters for Scientologists to overcome the fact that their religion sort of reads like an X-Files fan-ficition written by an 11 year old. But despite the fact that Scientologists are still struggling for credibility these days, their leader David Miscavige has decided to reveal this week that a man all women hate is their "christ-like figure". As quoted by The Sun: “Tom has been told he is Scientology’s Christ-like figure. Like Christ, he’s been criticised for his views. But future generations will realise he was right."

You just know that John Travolta is standing around somewhere angrily drawing an unflattering moustache and glasses on a photo of Tom Cruise then furiously tearing it into tiny pieces.

I have to say, I'm a little sceptical myself. Besides the fact that my mother always told me never to trust a man whose name rhymes with 'miscarriage', I'm really struggling to see what Tom Cruise has done to elevate himself to Messiah status. Yell at women for taking drugs that stop them from smothering their babies? Yell at Dustin Hoffman for two hours for being retarded? Try and sue some men who squirted him in the face with a water pistol? I'm really not seeing it.

Well...now that I think about it, Tom Cruise does have a few god-like qualities. For example, divine intervention is the only way I account for public opinion of Tom Cruise plummeting from most popular celebrity ever to most hated man in the whole world within about three weeks. And it was more than a little spooky when he somehow got "no sex before marriage" supporter Katie Holmes pregnant a whole year before they actually got married.

But it doesn't matter what I think about a man who became famous by starring in a movie about a boy losing his virginity to a prostitute being declared a christ-like figure because I'm not religious. From an objective stand-point however, this revelation has interesting cultural ramifications. For example, this weird linking of Christianity and Scientology actually means that Battlefield Earth can now be considered a prequel to Passion of the Christ.

Similarly, this whole story really highlights the inherent problems with the deification of historical figures. I mean, these days we think of Jesus as a strapping handsome young gentleman with sexy blue eyes and a lovely, flowing well conditioned mane of hair and beard. But I bet if we used a DeLorean to go back in time to oldey time Jerusalem we would probably find that Jesus was a creepy, obnoxious, short, middle-aged man with a funny nose and a weird, glassy-eyed child bride. Likewise, in a thousand years people will probably believe that Tom Cruise was some sort of tall, charismatic genius instead of just that plonker who jumped up and down on Oprah's sofa.

Unfortunately for Tom Cruise, I actually think that he is supposed to die before he can be considered a messianic figure. Now, David Miscavige didn't reveal whether or not they were going to go for the traditional nailed to a plank of wood. But if they're looking for ideas for Tom Cruise's inevitable martyrdom, I'm offering keelhauled or crushed in heavy machinery.