This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 1992, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
Copyright 1992, THE SALT LAKE TRIBUNE
In 1988, the Rev. Jentzsch was locked away for three months in a Spanish prison -- surrounded by cockroaches, drug smugglers and feces. He was thrown in jail for proselytizing Scientology -- less than 24 hours after arriving in Spain.
He felt he had come full circle.
Some 30 years earlier, his father Carl Eugene Jentzsch was imprisoned for taking five wives in Farmington, Utah.
``My father was a man who felt his religion could never be taken away from him by anyone,'' said the Rev. Jentzsch. ``Polygamy was the religion he wanted to live and he backed it up with his life.''
With his dark suit, white shirt, practical car, attentive gaze, easy laugh, ready indignation, and aphorisms aplenty, this tall, soft-spoken church leader could pass for a Mormon bishop. Though leaving Utah, the Rev. Jentzsch has never lost his Mormon accent and cadence.
Many of his friends and family remain in Utah. From numerous interviews and passages in a family diary, this portrait of the Scientology leader emerges:
Young Heber -- named after his mother's favorite Mormon apostle, Heber C. Kimball -- was born in 1935, the youngest child of Carl's third wife, Pauline. He was one of 42 children in a family that included eight wives.
Carl took his first polygamous wife while living in Salt Lake City on Lincoln Street near Liberty Park. As wives and children were added, the family moved to a large house on Holladay Boulevard. Finally, however, Carl's salary as an electrical engineer was inadequate to support the growing family so they moved to Farmington, where they could have several homes on the same farm.
The whole family continued to attend the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints even after notice of Carl Jentzsch's excommunication appeared in the local paper. When the bishop refused to allow Pauline's children to be baptized, however, they began to hold worship services at home.
``Father would read from the Mormon scriptures but also from National Geographic. He would talk about the great civilizations in Utah that he had seen as a young boy shepherding in the desert, but also about the great civilizations of South America.
``I never got that in the Mormon Church. That's when I began looking around and saying, what else is out there?''
In 1950 L. Ron Hubbard, an American writer and international adventurer, wrote a book called Dianetics. Mr. Hubbard's book became so popular that a self-enhancement movement known as Scientology emerged among its adherents. Today the movement has become a church, is proclaimed on street corners and in television ads and claims over 8 million members.
Scientologists believe specific mental and physical exercises will enhance intelligence, behavior and spiritual well-being.
The Rev. Jentzsch joined the movement in 1967. Four years later he helped start a mission for the stars -- recruiting California celebrities into the Scientology fold. Eventually, the Hollywood faithful would include Tom Cruise, John Travolta, Kirstie Alley, Anne Archer, Sonny Bono, and Nancy Cartwright, the voice of Bart Simpson.
When the Church of Scientology International was incorporated in 1981, the one-time actor and singer Jentzsch took on the role of a lifetime: church president.
There have been two pivotal moments in the Rev. Jentzsch's life. One was the day his father went to prison, the other was a life-healing cure using Scientology practices.
In 1955, Farmington police intended to arrest his father for practicing polygamy. When the elder Jentzsch got wind of it, he calmly turned himself in.
The Rev. Jentzsch says his father would not allow ``some crazy thing by the police, smashing into the doors, breaking into our homes.''
It was just before Thanksgiving. Light snow was falling.
The judge who tried the case was the son of a polygamist. The prosecuting attorney was also the son of a polygamist. They offered to let Carl go if he would apologize to the state and admit he had been wrong for all these years.
The Rev. Jentzsch tells the story with practiced pauses.
``My father said, `you see those women and children out there? Do you want me to tell them their lives are a lie? Well, it's not a lie.'
``The judge said Mr. Jentzsch, `are you trying to make yourself a martyr?'
``He said, `no your honor. The state makes martyrs. There are no self-made martyrs.' ''
Carl Jentzsch was sentenced to 1-5 years. As he left the courtroom, he scuffled with a Salt Lake Tribune photographer. He was freed after serving 15 months and moved the entire clan to Oregon, away from the prying eyes of a state once obsessed with polygamy prosecutions.
The senior Jentzsch died at 90 in 1991, believing to the end in polygamy as ``the Lord's way.''
The Rev. Jentzsch's second formative experience was his own.
At 15, he believed he was dying from radiation burns caused by the nuclear testing in Yucca Flats, Nev. He says he was exposed while turning hay in a farm near Farmington. Although experts say there has never been a recorded case of skin burn in Utah from the tests, the Rev. Jentzsch says it changed his life.
``I had blisters all over my body,'' he said. ``The doctors said, `We'll save your life and then we'll work on your face.' ''
The Rev. Jentzsch says he put cocoa butter and boric acid packs on his face for three days every half-hour. He says many children downwind of the Nevada Test Site died from cancer, including several friends from Farmington.
The pollutants and chemicals from the radiation were in his body for years, until he was cleansed by the ``purification process'' of Scientology.
``The fatty tissues of the body tend to retain chemicals and drugs,'' says the Rev. Jentzsch. L. Ron Hubbard's teachings called for a cure of combined vitamins, exercise and saunas.
For the Rev. Jentzsch, the process took five hours a day for 39 days. After that, he felt free from the radiation that had plagued his body for decades.
``Scientology literally saved my life,'' he says.
The Rev. Jentzsch attended Weber College, then a two-year school. He graduated from the University of Utah in 1959 with a degree in communications. Shortly after graduation he was drafted. In the Army he served primarily as an entertainer, singing in the Army chorus at Fort Meade in Maryland.
After he was discharged, the Rev. Jentzsch -- full of youthful ambition -- headed for Hollywood to embark on a singing career.
He wound up in Las Vegas instead, singing, acting, doing stage work. It was there he found Scientology.
``I came into Scientology because I wanted something that was predictable, a technology,'' he underscored the word. He wanted a way to heal people with ``psychosomatic illnesses.''
By studying intensively ``the specific technical counseling'' for about four months in 1974, the Rev. Jentzsch qualified as a church minister.
By 1981, the group decided to incorporate as an international church.
One of the new minister's first ideas was to cater the church's missionary efforts toward the artistic community. The church bought the mansion on Hollywood Boulevard, spent millions restoring it to splendor, and dubbed it ``the Celebrity Centre.'' They began publishing Celebrity magazine, which profiles well-known Scientologists.
For his innovation of the celebrity mission, the Rev. Jentzsch was rewarded with the position of first president of the Church of Scientology International. Ironically, he never met the founder, L. Ron Hubbard, who died in 1986.
As president, the Rev. Jenztsch travels the globe representing the church. He meets with leaders of other churches -- including the LDS Church -- on issues of mutual concern such as religious freedom. He also gives speeches and holds conferences for believers.
It was at such a conference that Spanish authorities threw him in prison. The Scientologists paid $780,000 to get him out, and the 90-day experience was his crucible of faith. The Rev. Jentzsch expects to preach the Scientology way to self-understanding till he dies.