Urging Peace and Tolerance in the Wake of Terror

French and Belgian Scientologists reach out to their communities with a booklet renowned for its ability to spread calm in turbulent times.

French and French-speaking Belgian Scientologists have produced a special edition of Le Chemin du Bonheur, the French translation of The Way to Happiness, a nonreligious moral code based entirely on common sense. These booklets bear the image of the French and Belgian flags respectively and the phrase “Paix et Tolerance” (Peace and Tolerance). And, in the wake of the recent terrorist attacks, they have been handing out copies of the booklet and encouraging shopkeepers and taxi drivers to distribute them to their customers.

Their reason for doing so is reflected in a recent Toronto Star editorial, concerned that the Brussels terrorist attacks “reinforced a hard truth: Islamic terrorism presents a real threat to Western society. Not because immigration, multiculturalism, and asylum leave us vulnerable to violent ideologies, but because the specter of terrorism offers fertile ground for our most illiberal tendencies.”

The Way to Happiness is a nonreligious commonsense guide to better living—a moral code of 21 precepts that anyone of any faith or belief may follow to live a happier, more honest and decent life. The booklet’s moral precepts not only provide a guideline for one’s own behavior, they are also a way the individual can influence those around him by putting a copy of the booklet in their hands.

“Trying to survive in a chaotic, dishonest and generally immoral society is difficult,” the booklet states. “Any individual or group seeks to obtain from life what pleasure and freedom from pain that they can. Your own survival can be threatened by the bad actions of others around you. Your own happiness can be turned to tragedy and sorrow by the dishonesty and misconduct of others… It is in your power to point the way to a less dangerous and happier life.”

The booklet’s precepts include, “Set a good example,” “Do not harm a person of goodwill,” “Respect the religious beliefs of others,” and “Try not to do things to others that you would not like them to do to you.”

The Way to Happiness has helped to bring calm to communities torn by violence, peace to areas ravaged by civil strife and self-respect to millions of individuals—in schools, prisons and churches as well as youth and community centers. The power of the booklet has been demonstrated time and time again in the miraculous results witnessed wherever the book is distributed, demonstrating the sheer genius of L. Ron Hubbard’s moral compass for life that has benefited more than 100 million people over the past 30 years.

• When the National Police of Colombia adopted The Way to Happiness and undertook nationwide distribution, reaching 20 percent of the population, the nation’s crime rates plummeted.
• In Los Angeles communities beset by violence, rival motorcycle gangs distributing The Way to Happiness achieved crime drops of between 15 and 30 percent after every “Peace Ride.”
• Police in an eastern Slovakian community attributed a 40 percent reduction in the crime rate to widespread distribution of The Way to Happiness.

The Way to Happiness holds the Guinness World Record as the single most-translated nonreligious book and fills the moral vacuum in an increasingly materialistic society.