Sallekhana Jain community. It has not been a "practical or general goal" among Svetambara Jains for many years. It was revived among Digambara monks. In 1955, Acharya Shantisagar, a Digambara monk took the vow because of his inability to walk without help and his weak eye-sight. In 1999, Acharya Vidyanand, another Digambara monk, took a twelve-year-long vow. Between 1800 and 1992, at least 37 instances of "Sallekhana" are recorded in Jain literature. There were 260 and 90 recorded Sallekhana deaths among Svetambara and Digambara Jains respectively between 1993 and 2003. According to Jitendra Shah, the Director of L D Institute of
Religion in the Canary Islands in Spain before it was occupied by the military of the Franco regime. There are other small religious communities qualified as sects, such as the Church of Scientology (of which its founder L. Ron Hubbard visited the Canary Islands several times between the 60s and the 70s of the 20th century) and the Order of the Solar Temple, among others. Especially singular is the Church of the Guanche People, a neo-pagan religion founded in 2001 that tries to implement the Canarian aboriginal religion as an ethnic religion in the current Canarian society. Religion in the Canary Islands As in the