Masons are human beings and they do what human beings do. I personally have NEVER heard Masons discuss the business contacts and opportunities that might derive from being a Mason. YMMV and obviously does. Whatever your experience might have been, prospective Masons are required to swear that their purpose in joining is not one of acquiring any advantage in business. It is a relatively simple statement, short and straightforward, with no nuances; no wink-wink, nudge-nudge. If simplicity and straightforwardness seem “out of a can” then so be it. If you have heard Masons talk about business advantages and contacts being the reason they joined, they obviously lied at a critical point in the initiation process. If that is the case, they don’t deserve to be called Masons.
And, if your father has been master of a “number of lodges,” he has been involved with lodges that differ sharply from those with which I am familiar. Many lodges do not allow a Mason to hold simultaneous memberships in other lodges. Some do, true, but most do not.
The repercusions involved with violating one’s oath are simply hyperbole. I’ve never met a person who seriously believed those repercusions would, or had ever, been inforced. The hyperbole is used simply to illustrate the seriousness with which true Masons take those oaths. If you believe otherwise, then you are hopelessly naive in addition to being judgemental.
You cite the teachings of Christ as if they are an irrefutable source; such is not the case. I don’t see where reason or human decency are violated; maybe you, from your position of a Non-Mason, can enlighten us misguided Masons.
Masons are interested in building a better world. Hopefully, we serve as examples of the true meaning of our oaths; we act, rather than talk. Our actions are our advocacy of our guiding principles. How do we, as Masons, not behave as responsible citizens? I would honestly like to know. As to your comments re nine year old boys and “bad nastiness,” they are simply beneath contempt and don’t deserve even an attempt at refutation.
If the RCC has a point, you have failed completely to illuminate it.
I work in PR now for my sins in a former life, and one thing I’ve learned in five years is that the reason given for an action is never the major reason, and quite frequently not the reason at all. For example, ‘we are doing ABC for our customers’ = "we are doing ABC for the board of directors and our shareholders’. A useful rule of thumb is reverse the given reason to find the true reason.
In other words, your experience is with liars and hypocrites. From this, you assign lieing and hypocracy to everyone. How clearly you reveal the mistakes that others have made when they are naive enough to believe that some people actually mean what they say and say what they mean. By your standards, when my darling Marcie promised to “forsake all others,” she clearly meant that immediately after our marriage ceremony was finished, she intended to embark on a life of unbridled promiscuity. It is difficult to imagine anyone being more wrong than you in their assesment of other’s honesty.
I was referring to the business milieu rather than the personal one. It’s sadly a fact of life that whether it’s Bush or Blair (let alone Hu Jin-tao!), or McDonald’s or Microsoft, or Amnesty International or various churches I could mention (but won’t), ‘line-to-takes’ are established, updated and adhered to when dealing with the media. These often tend to the type of discursive practice that I outlined.
Of course, it follows from what I contend that, if true (or approaching the truth) individuals who are participants in such practices (as producer or receiver, or both) need to be alert to the danger of behaving thus in their more private spheres of life.
Sauron, after reading this amazingly enlightening thread, I think I have to agree with Scott for anything like the forseeable future.
I’d like to see what, if any, difference there is between being a “good, giving, community guy” and being a “good, giving, community guy and a mason.”
I’m a good guy, and from what I’ve seen here share a great many of the same ideals espoused by the Masonic institution, in fact having some of the words plucked right from my brain by LiousB - but I’m no mason and don’t really see the point of partaking in that kind of order if it’s only there to provide it’s members reasons to get together.
LiousB said earlier that “Masons act where others speak of acting,” or something akin, but other that seeing the big 'ol Masonic Temple two miles from my house, I’ve never seen or heard of any tangible contribution they’ve ever made to anything.
Being a bunch of free-thinking and caring individuals with a lust for learning but meeting for any other reason but to help out others seems contradictory to me.
I’ve never seen a Mason-run food drive, nor Mason-sponsored scholarships to architecturally-minded colleges - and these are the least “good things” I’d think they could concievable do.
Now if these things do happen, it really looks like they are working in the dark and that just gives credence to those who fear what is not openly visable.
AHEM!!!
Sorry for having contributed to the hijack.
ANd I personally think organized Churches are far too bloody thick-headed and blind to see any good thing without their own stamp on it as a good thing at all.
If you’ve ever seen or heard of a Shrine Burn Center, you’ve seen or heard of Masonic charity. If you or a loved one ever have the misfortune to suffer severe burns and cannot afford medical treatment, the Shrine will provide free transportation to the nearest burn center, where you will receive free medical care for as long as needed. I wish Paul of Saudi would respond to this one; he is a lot more familiar with the burn centers. Masons contribute one million dollars a day, on average, to various charities. We provide scholarships to various college students; we organize blood drives; we allow other groups to use our Lodge buildings as a place to hold pancake breakfasts, dinners, etc., etc. We don’t usually ballyhoo our “official” charitable actions; if we were dependent on public contributions for our existense, you would hear more about our efforts.
In post#110 above, I expressed a wish that Paul in Saudiwould comment on the Shriner’s Burn Centers. In fact, he did so in post#77, back on page 2 of this thread. I appologize to Paul in Saudi for my oversight of his, as always, informative post.
If not for the “power” and “contacts” argument, if it is not a religion, I am curious to know what exactly draws people to this secret society in this day and age? After all, it’s not like reformist or free-thinking talk is prohibited in much of the world. I have heard masons not only talk about the network and advantages that come with masonry, I have actually heard several boast of them. Perhaps this is, indeed, the same set of masons who do not deserve to be called Masons as you point out, however that would seem to include an awful lot of people.
Clearly these would be the same puerile fools who are attracted to secret societies for precisely such reasons in the first place, nevertheless, human nature being what it is, it seems virtually impossible that members of a large secret society would actively forego opportunities for advancement of its members. Humans are extremely tribalistic, after all.
I’ve also had some brushes with Masons where I now live, and it seems to me that if Masonry were indeed entirely about a better world, they could not exist within China’s borders. Yet exist they do, and I’ve even known members of the PRC Communist Party who were Masons – and members of the PRC Communist Party don’t join secret societies for the betterment of mankind, they join secret societies that will help them get ahead in their cut-throat environment!
Perhaps you misunderstood. I do not know if (nor did I claim that) my father has been a master of multiple lodges simultaneously; simply that he has been a master of a number of lodges, at least three or four at last count a few years back. Definitely sequentially, but perhaps (though I don’t know, since it’s a secret) simultaneously.
Here is Cecil’s take on freemasonry, where he also mentions objections from some organized religions:
Umberto Eco once lampooned P2 in a great little essay (P x 2 = PP, sounds like pipi, or piss), and of course also wrote the brilliant Focault’s Pendulum, which is all about secret societies. At least that’s one intellectual who isn’t a Mason – according to some Mason claims, the majority of all persons of influence are or were Masons, and we have them to thank for civilization (!).
I enjoy the fact that I have brothers all over the world. As I travel a lot, I somehow feel more at home knowing that I am a member of an international fraternity. That is not to say I have ever gotten anything but a free lunch on my travels, bit the idea appeals to me.
Most people (I think) like to have a place to go one night a month. It gets them out of the house.
Most important to me is the idea of being a member of a movement that is ancient in its origins and liberal in its goals. Masonry has been opposed by Hitler, Stalin, Mao and Franco, that goes a long way to recommend it in my book. The Masonic virtues of Brotherly Love, Relief and Truth are important to me in my life. I am pleased to belong to a group that champions them.
The idea of a worldwide brotherhood united by ideals and not divided by race, language or religion is important to me.
The only information I can find that confirms the existence of Masonry in China is this. Taiwan, I submit, is not exactly the same as mainland China. Masonry is officialy banned in China, by the Chinese government, as it is in all countries under the rule of totalitarian governments.
Paul in Saudi gave an excellent reading on why men join the Masonic Fraternity.
I’ve no doubt that some Masons do treat other Masons preferentially and that preferential treatment may well extend to business relations. The fact remains that initiates swear they are not joining for purposes of advancing themselves in business. If, at the time they swear to this, their purpose in joining was to advance themselves in business, they lied when they said otherwise. I don’t doubt that men have and will lie about this, but it doesn’t make them any the less liars.
As to simultaneous memberships in different lodges, I state again that most lodges with which I am familiar do not allow a Mason to hold memberships in two or more lodges at the same time. Some lodges do permit this, most don’t. If a man moves away from his home lodge and wants to become active in a new lodge, he usually drops his membership in the home lodge and becomes a member of the new lodge. If a man’s career causes him to move several times, he may well repeat the process. If this is the course pursued by your father, he might well have been Master of several Lodges. I erred in assuming he maintained his membership in his home lodge; he may or may not have done so, depending on the by-laws of the particular Lodge.
