Tom Cruise (top) and Anne Archer

London, Oct. 23: There was a fairly simple system to the seating plan at the annual big money get-together of the Church of Scientology in Sussex this weekend: the more you pay, the nearer to Tom Cruise you get.

To those willing to part with £500 or £600, the star of the Mission Impossible daftoramas was a mere speck in the distance, at the far end of the gigantic, gold-draped, candle-lit marquee.

The Hollywood superstar was separated from the merely very wealthy by an enclosure reserved for the global elite of one of the more curious organisations on the planet. Not to mention off it.

For those wanting to sit within whiffing distance of Cruise’s aftershave, the price was a little higher, at £1,000 a seat.

The high-security gathering at the Scientologist headquarters at Saint Hill Manor, near East Grinstead, on Saturday night presaged the opening yesterday of the “church’s” enormous new centre in the city of London, a £25 million tribute to its founder, L. Ron Hubbard.

A prolific and rather barmy science fiction writer, it was he who one day decided that it might be fun, and lucrative, to set up his own “religion” — and so he did, stocking it with tales of an evil galactic overlord called Xenu, interstellar travel, nuclear holocaust and disembodied soul beings called Thetans.

Cruise, the world’s most famous exponent of this colourful belief system, did not attend the rain-soaked ceremony in the Square Mile.

But it was no less bizarre for his absence, involving surreal, admiring speeches from a senior officer in the city of London police and a senior member of the corporation of London.

John Travolta, that other notable believer, was a no-show. But the Golden Globe-winning TV actress Jenna Elfman was there, and at the opening ceremony in the city, as was Hollywood actress Anne Archer. It was unclear whether Cruise’s partner Katie Holmes attended.

Some 3,000 Scientologists gathered for the opening, which was picketed by a small number of people who claim to have been harmed by their involvement with what some regard as a dangerous cult.

The opening ceremony yesterday started with a Highland pipe band. Alderman Ian Luder, representing the Lord Mayor, said: “History is being made before our very eyes.”