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Yes, we've seen the incredibly viral e-mail (you can read it here) puporting to explain the connection between Tom Cruise, Katie Holmes, and Matchbox 20 singer Rob Thomas. And this is all we have to say about it (besides issuing a inevitably futile request that people stop sending it to us): We immediately distrust any mass-emailed message that begins thusly: "A friend of mine just got back from LA and heard this scoop about Tom & Katie from someone who works at Universal..." Firstly, LA is full of nothing but filthy, filthy liars who would like nothing better than to destroy the man responsible for "Push." We live there, we should know. Secondly, as soon as we hear that the singer's received a mysterious delivery of cupcakes, you'll be the first to know. We fear that this e-mail of dubious truth value is obscuring something far more worthy of discussion: Tom Cruise's unshakeable faith in aliens.
· Fellow Scientologist John Travolta's Scientologist wife, who once bounced up and down on Tom Cruise's prone body while very convincingly screaming, "Don't. Ever. Stop. Fucking. Me!" in the early moments of Jerry Maguire, is unsurprisingly supportive of Cruise's evangelical efforts. [second item]
· "'We have always tried to resolve disputes short of litigation. That was not always possible in earlier years when we were forced to go to court to defend our rights and the rights of our parishioners to freely practice their religion. But as we have won more and more victories, we have had to resort to the courts much less. Nowadays it is a very rare occurrence.'" Has Scientology suddenly gone soft? Salon continues its four-part series. [You may watch an ad to read the story.]
· And just because every story has a Cruise angle, if you look hard enough: Cruise has always maintained that he doesn't see race, so he wouldn't even have understood the premise behind the recently-pulled reality show Welcome to the Neighborhood.