I was in one last week that had a window - but very high up, and small, with a tacky cement Masonic symbol “decorating” it. Didn’t really think about it at the time. The walls give them more room to hang pictures of past Masters and plaques and flags and stuff, perhaps. Looks like the masculine version of a ten year old girl’s notebook up in there.
To discourage eavesdroppers.
Probably not such a big problem now, but back in the day people used to care. History is important, and if lodges historically had no windows, future lodges should have no windows.
It wasn’t really so long ago that, in parts of Europe, being caught at a Masonic gathering led to an uncomfortable time.
IANAM, but members of my family have been involved in the order.
Their By-Laws state that their meetings are to be considered secret. The reason for the secrecy is based on tradition stemming from the origins of the order. They were once a (very) secret society whose members were tracked down, tortured and killed by a religious inquisition. During that time even their membership was secret. Now members of the order have no problem if you know they belong but they still maintain secrets of the order.
Why? Well one reason may be that, as a fraternal order, sharing secrets forgers a bond among members of the group.
From my experience with an affiliated organization, the secrets are neither sinister, nor enlightening.
SSHHH! Grand Poobah VGW needs a place to rest and now everyone is going to be storming lodges with their pitchforks and torches and I’ll have to haul His Toothlessness to the Elks lodge and he’ll hit the bar again, and we all know what happens when undead Founding Fathers get drunk.
