Ah, the tangled web of Hollywood relationships! It brings to mind the saying, “You can’t really know someone until you walk a mile in their shoes”. So, let’s put on the oddly shaped shoes of Katie Holmes and journey back to the time when her marriage with Tom Cruise was making more headlines. It’s time to rewind the clock and revisit the juicy details of a celebrity union that had more layers than an onion.

Tom Cruise in a still from Taps | Credit: 20th Century Fox

Now, Holmes has mostly kept mum about her split from Cruise, but rumors suggest her decision to leave the action star had a lot to do with her desire to shield her daughter from the Church of Scientology’s, shall we say, peculiarities.

Katie Holmes & Tom Cruise: The Scientology Saga Revisited as Suri Cruise Turned 18

You know what they say: “When the going gets tough, the tough get going!” And boy, did Katie Holmes get going when it came to her marriage to Tom Cruise.

Holmes has mostly kept her lips sealed about her split from the Top Gun star. However, whispers suggest that one of her main motivations for walking away was to keep Suri Cruise far from the Church of Scientology. While that’s enough to make any mom’s hair stand on end, it turns out there might be more than just one reason behind her decision to leave after nearly six years of marriage.
Katie Holmes in a still from Alone Together | Credit: Vertical

Let’s face it: raising a kid in a controversial religion isn’t exactly a walk in the park, especially when you consider how little, say, Cruise’s second wife, Nicole Kidman, had in raising Isabella Jane and Connor Cruise. But hold on; the drama doesn’t stop there! According to Ron Miscavige (via She Knows), the estranged father of Scientology’s head honcho, David Miscavige, the Cruise household wasn’t exactly a peaceful abode.

“That didn’t sit so well with Katie, of course, and it hurt the marriage,” Miscavige shared with the Daily Mail back in 2016. You can almost hear Holmes saying:

I didn’t sign up for a live-in reality show! 

Now, let’s not forget that her fears weren’t unfounded. Kidman’s own struggles with the church came to light in the 2015 documentary Going Clear: Scientology and the Prison of Belief. That’s some heavy stuff for a mom to digest!

Katie Holmes Spilled the Beans About Suri Cruise

Katie Holmes & Suri Cruise | Katie Holmes’ Instagram @katieholmes
Katie Holmes and Tom Cruise welcomed their daughter, Suri Cruise, in 2006, and their romance was plastered across the tabloids like peanut butter on toast—thick and impossible to ignore. The couple tied the knot the same year, in a lavish Scientologist ceremony held at the stunning 15th-century Odescalchi Castle in Bracciano, Italy.

However, Holmes filed for divorce in 2012, shocking the world. The divorce granted her full custody of her daughter (via Daily News). And, while she tends to keep her cards close to her chest regarding her life with Suri Cruise, she did open up about their relationship in an interview with The Times. She shared how her evolving sense of fashion mirrored the phases of motherhood.

She confessed:

When my child was really small I was drawn to wearing a lot of dresses. You do go through these different phases of motherhood and they inform what you feel comfortable in and what you don’t. So over the years, my style has changed here and there.

In true mom fashion, Holmes even saved some of her clothes for Suri Cruise, hoping they’d be the next big hit in her daughter’s wardrobe. But she also acknowledged that her daughter has developed her own tastes and styles.