How Katie Holmes tackled the Risky Business of leaving Scientology: As Suri turns 18 with Tom Cruise said to have 'no part' in her life, how the Dawson's Creek star parted ways with the church and came out unscathed with the help of her secret weapon

As Suri Cruise turns 18 and prepares to embark upon a career in fashion, her prospects are unlimited - but her life could have ended up looking very different indeed.

When Suri's mother Katie Holmes divorced her father Tom Cruise, she removed her daughter from the controversial religion which is known to play a key role in Tom's life: Scientology.

Katie and Tom married in a Scientologist ceremony in Italy in 2006 when the Dawson's Creek actress was 27 and the Mission Impossible star was 44. However, during the six years they were married sources close to Katie suggested she felt increasingly intimidated by the church, in which Tom remains a powerful figure today.

Now, neither mother nor daughter, who are based in New York, are said to have contact with Tom Cruise, and a source revealed last year that the Top Gun star has 'no part' in his daughter's life. 

As both Katie and Suri enjoy their freedom from the divisive church, they are among the few people to have made a break from Scientology with as little drama as possible. Other prominent figures who have left the Church have claimed they were subject to harassment and intimidation after leaving.

When the couple split in 2012, it was reported that Katie had chosen to end the couple's marriage over fears about raising her daughter as a Scientologist - a religion that Tom is incredibly dedicated to.

Her decision to quit the religion, as well as the marriage, caused a major rift between the former spouses, which has seen Tom and Suri's relationship become increasingly distant over the years.

MailOnline revealed in 2016 that Katie feared she would lose Suri to Scientology, after seeing how Tom's first wife Nicole Kidman became distanced from the children she adopted with him, Bella and Connor, when they remained within the church after she left.

It was reported that Katie's final straw came when members of the Church of Scientology moved into the couple's home.

Ron Miscavige, the father of Scientology leader David, who himself renounced the religion, told DailyMail.com that there is a 'toxic' policy of 'disconnection' operating within the church - which is something Katie feared would be implemented to keep her away from her daughter. 

Speaking to the website in 2016, five years before he passed away, Ron (who was estranged from David) explained that the disconnection policy sees Scientologists cut off contact with any family member who leaves the church. He claimed it happened to him, not only with son David, but also with his two daughters, Denise and Lori. 

He claimed members of the church's staff, known as Sea Org, moved in with Cruise and Holmes, to make sure the organization's most valuable celebrity was being properly taken care of.

'That didn't sit so well with Katie, of course, and it hurt the marriage,' he said. 'She and Tom had big differences about the way life should be lived.'

He added Katie was concerned about the prospect of raising Suri in the church. 

Ron's assertions which paint a picture of an oppressive and controlling environment are echoed by other prominent voices who speak out against Scientology after having broken free from the church - an image which the church itself denies.

Comedy actress Leah Remini has often shared her fears for the future after leaving the church, claiming she has felt her safety, and the safety of her family members, is under threat.

In August last year, Remini filed a lawsuit against the church, claiming its members had harassed, defamed and followed her to the point of 'psychological torture'.

As the lawsuit was filed in a California court, she issued a statement which read: 'For 17 years, Scientology and David Miscavige have subjected me to what I believe to be psychological torture, defamation, surveillance, harassment and intimidation, significantly impacting my life and career. 

'I believe I am not the first person targeted by Scientology and its operations, but I intend to be the last.'

Leah is not the only person to have claimed they suffered intimidation after leaving the church, with Oscar-winning film director Paul Haggis also claiming he was subject to a campaign of harassment by prominent Scientologists.

In November 2022, he was found liable for the rape of publicist Haleigh Breest in an incident in Italy in 2013 and ordered to pay her a total of $10 million.  

Throughout the trial and after the jury's verdict, Haggis insisted the allegations had been orchestrated by the Church of Scientology and that he had been falsely accused.

After he left the court, he said he will 'die clearing my name' and vowed to appeal. 

In 2015, a documentary about the Church, Going Clear: Scientology and the Prison of Belief revealed an in-depth look into how the church operates and claims made by people who have left about what happened to them. 

Directed by Alex Gibney, the documentary interviews several people who left the church including Paul Haggis.

One of the allegations made in the film was that Scientologists conspired to 'facilitate the break up' of Tom Cruise's second marriage to Nicole Kidman because the head of the church, David Miscavige, was suspicious of her.

Kidman's was listed as a 'Potential Trouble Source' because her father was a psychologist in Australia, according to the Daily Beast.

Gibney's film claims that Kidman, who was raised Catholic, convinced Cruise to distance himself from the Church of Scientology between 1992 and 2001.

It also alleges that during the filming of Stanley Kubrick's Eyes Wide Shut, Cruise wasn't returning Miscavige's phone calls, even though he was the best man at the actor's wedding.

Marty Rathbun, a former senior executive of the Church of Scientology, said an aggressive campaign was launched to break up the couple.

It included wiretapping Kidman's phone and psychoanalyzing Cruise and his movements around the clock. 

The personal information they gathered was then passed to Miscavige who is believed to have condemned Cruise for his 'sexual fetishes'.

Rathbun even states that the Church of Scientology 're-educated' Cruise's adopted children, Connor and Isabella, so they would turn against their mother in a bid to make Cruise's custody case stronger.

The Church denounced the allegations made in the explosive film upon its release. In a five-page letter to the Hollywood Reporter, the church said: 'By our calculation, the film on average includes at least one major error every two minutes.'

Although breaking free from the Church and divorcing its most influential member was a risky business, Katie Holmes had a secret weapon - her divorce attorney father, Martin Holmes.

People magazine reported Katie turned to Martin for advice before making any moves to split from Tom and that he 'helped orchestrate his daughter's sudden split' from the actor. 

'Marty is very rigid – it's his way or the highway,' a Toledo attorney who has worked with Martin told the magazine.

'Marty believes there are only two sets of rules: the rules of the court and his rules, and he carries himself that way.'

Divorce documents at the time revealed that Katie Holmes would receive $400,000 every year from multi-millionaire Tom in the way of child support until Suri turns 18.

The Hollywood actor would also pay for Suri's medical and dental expenses as well as her insurance, education costs and college tuition. The money is reportedly paid by electronic transfer. 

Regarding Suri's education, the couple agreed their daughter would not attend boarding school - which quashed rumours she would attend a Scientology-led institution.

Katie was granted sole custody of their daughter while Tom was allowed 'meaningful' visitation rights.

However, Tom has not been seen out in public with his daughter for around a decade, and sources have claimed he now has little involvement in her life. 

The last photo of the Top Gun actor out and about with his daughter was a trip to Disneyland in 2012, the year his divorce from Katie was finalised. 

That same year, the Hollywood titan was reported not to have seen his daughter for more than 100 days, between a holiday they took in August and Thanksgiving in November. 

After In Touch magazine reported that Cruise had 'abandoned' his daughter, he sued the publication for libel in a $50 million lawsuit in 2012. As the case played out in court, he acknowledged he had gone around three months without seeing Suri, but added that it was due to factors out of his control.

Instead, he explained he had been working to a tight and intense filming schedule on his action movie All You Need is Kill in London, which left little room for free time of any kind.

'Unfortunately in this situation it was impossible,' he told the court, according to People.

He added that, far from abandoning his daughter, he called her every day - although he conceded it was not the same as seeing his young daughter in person and that speaking to a child on the phone can be difficult.

He said: 'You have to work at it. I've gotten very good at it. I tell wonderful stories.'

The New York Times reported the following year that Cruise had settled the lawsuit against In Touch's publisher, Bauer, out of court. 

As Suri reaches adolescence and begins a new stage of her life, another source close to Katie told Dailymail.com: 'Being raised by a single mom in New York has made Suri who she is. Katie has always put Suri first and Suri loves her mom more than anything.

Throughout her childhood Katie did her best to keep Suri out of the limelight as much as possible. However, since the teenager turned 16, the actress has begun to reveal a little more about her daughter's life.

In 2021, a trailer for a rom-com starring and directed by Holmes, Alone Together, featured Suri singing Blue Moon on the soundtrack, as her mother praised her daughter as 'the best'. 

Speaking to Yahoo Entertainment about her decision to cast her daughter as the singer of the cover, Holmes was full of praise for Suri.

She said: 'I always want the highest level of talent. So I asked her! She's very, very talented. She said she would do it and she recorded it, and I let her do her thing.'

In the same interview, Holmes revealed she had also enlisted Suri to sing in another film she had directed, Rare Objects.

Despite two very impressive credits to her name and being the daughter of two of Hollywood's biggest names, Holmes insisted Suri remained, for the most part, 'a 16-year-old kid doing high school'.

Aside from a potential singing career (with a little help from her mother), Suri is thought to be something of a fashionista who inspires her mother, with Holmes recently revealing she sometimes pinches accessories from her daughter.

Back in 2011 when Suri was just four years old, Katie Holmes told Elle that her daughter would often pass comment on her clothes.

She revealed: 'Today I'm wearing brown suede pants, and she said, 'I don't like your pants'. But then she'll say, 'You've got to wear these shoes' or 'That's so pretty, Mom. Wear that'. She's got a great eye.'

During an interview with InStyle in 2020, Holmes sat down to chat while wearing her then 14-year-old daughter's purple hair scrunchie.

She revealed that, by then, Suri had surpassed the 'girlie stage' of her life and was becoming her own person.

Gushing with affection for her daughter, Holmes said she had raised Suri to be independent and hard working.

'She came out very strong — she's always been a strong personality. She'll pick an activity and work her butt off until she's really good at it,' Holmes described.

'Then she's like, 'OK, I'm going to try the next thing'. She's very focused and a hard worker.'

As for Holmes herself, the actress who made her debut as the coy-yet-boisterous Joey in Dawson's Creek has honed her artistic flair in recent years, taking on directing projects including a lockdown romance film on which Suri sang.

Katie was inspired to write Alone Together after seeing the legend in the 1987 film Baby Boom. 

Since her split with Tom, Katie had a private relationship with Jamie Foxx for several years from 2013 until 2019, with the couple only revealing their romance to the public shortly before the split.

She also dated chef Emilio Vitolo and Bobby Wooten III.