{Poll} Are these FOF celebs acting spiritual or silly?

Bless their souls for their unwavering devotion… or should we say a prayer for these FOF celebs? Read about their religious practices, then decide, are these stars “acting” spiritual or just plain silly?

PLAYBOY: Sounds like you have all the answers. Where do we go when we die?
Kirstie Alley: We just pick another body. We go to the nearest hospital where women are giving birth, find some good-looking parents and jump in.
-Excerpt from an interview with Playboy on her beliefs rooted in Scientology, 2008.

Scientology may have saved Kirstie Alley’s soul… but has Kirstie sold her soul to them? In 1979, the FOF actress attended a Scientology-supported rehab program which she says saved her from a serious cocaine addiction. “I thought, O.K., this is either the world’s biggest scam or it’s fabulous,” she said in a Time Magazine article. “I stopped working, quit my job, and I drove my car to California to be a Scientologist.” In 2000, Kirstie Alley bought a $1.5 million mansion in Clearwater, FL, Scientology’s spiritual headquarters. In 2007, she gifted $5 million to the Church of Scientology and appeared in this preachy pamphlet in which she gives the religion rave reviews. In addition to saving her from a drug addiction, Kirstie Alley credits Scientology – along with Jenny Craig – for helping her lose weight, says CBS News. “Without Scientology, I’d be dead,” Kirstie Alley said, according to Gawker.

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Is Madonna practicing Kabbalah in good faith? On her Re-Invention World Tour in 2004, Madonna rocked a “Kabbalists Do It Better” t-shirt. In 1997 she threw a Kabbalah cocktail party. “Since Madonna first started singing Kabbalah’s praises six years ago — literally, on her 1998 album Ray of Light— she has arguably become the practice’s most prominent advocate,” according to a USA Today article from 2004. She may be the most prominent advocate, but Madonna’s showy acts of spirituality have upset some Rabbis and scholars who say she’s “preaching a practice whose ties to traditional, ancient Kabbalah are tenuous at best and treacherous at worst,” according to the same USA Today article. “Watchdog types say the Kabbalah Center is more about merchandising — ’empowered’ stones, soul-cleansing water, those $26 strings — than enlightenment.” According to a BBC article, Madonna defended her practice of Kabbalah, saying, “it would be less controversial if I joined the Nazi Party,” and it’s “not hurting anybody.”

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There’s a real, live witch hunt going on in Hollywood, with FOF singer-songwriter Stevie Nicks in question for her involvement in Wicca. Known for her mystical fashion  — billowing chiffon skirts, shawls and layers of lace — it’s no mystery where the rumors of witchcraft surfaced. “Some rather credulous people believe her lyrics in songs such as Rhiannon, Gold Dust Woman and even the recent Sorcerer reference a demi-monde of white magic and wiccan ritual,” writes Guy Blackman in a 2006 article for The Age. Furthermore, her music is copyrighted under the name Welsh Witch Music. When confronted about the rumors Stevie says it’s all a bunch of hocus-pocus. “I have no idea what precipitated those rumors… I am not a witch. Get a life!” she said in a Yahoo chat in 1998. “I spent thousands of dollars on beautiful black clothes and had to stop wearing them for a long time because a lot of people scared me. And that’s really unfair to me, I think, for people – other people – to conjure up their ideas of what I am or what I believe in,” Nicks said in a 1983 Entertainment Tonight interview.

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Academy Award winning English actress and FOF Judi Dench was first attracted to the Quaker faith because she loved the school uniforms, according to an article on the Hampshire Quakers website. But, her devotion to the religion has become much more than a fashion statement.  Raised Methodist, she converted to Quakerism after attending The Mount School, a Quaker public secondary school in York, England. “It’s essential to my life and work,” she said of her faith to a reporter for The Guardian. But it seems, she still has a sense of humor about her faith. “When we were doing Arbuzov’s The Promise,” she recalls, “I said to Ian McKellen we should keep three seats empty and imagine we were playing to God the Father, Son and Holy Ghost. Ian rather wittily said, ‘Surely we’ll only need one seat rather than three?'”

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A hot debate has surfaced over FOF actress Trudie Styler and rock star hubby, Sting’s sex life. The couple have long been rumored to practice tantric sex “in which they use yoga to achieve prolonged states of ecstasy,” according to a New York Post article. “Sadomasochism is the new Tantra,” Trudie once said according to a Huffington Post article. Tantra is “Hindu or Buddhist scriptures dealing especially with techniques and rituals including meditative and sexual practices,” according to the Merriam-Webster dictionary. Still, Hindu leaders are not amused by the couple’s loose interpretation of tantra as a sex practice. “Hindus welcomed Hollywood and other celebrities to immerse in Hinduism, but taking it seriously and not just flirting with its terminology and concepts and using it as a fashion statement,” Rajan Zed, president of Universal Society of Hinduism said according to TheIndian.com.

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Images via Zimbio: Kirstie Alley, Madonna, Stevie Nicks, Judi Dench, Trudie Styler