Are You A Freemason?
Have you confirmed that lately?
Here in Washington State, and I’m assuming in a great many other places as well, we reach a very dramatic moment in our Craft Degrees in which we are asked if we believe ourselves to be Freemasons.
Today, I ask: Are we Freemasons? The dues card in our wallet and the ring on our finger don’t make us so. Our Obligations, if ignored, do not make us so. Going to Masonic meetings doesn’t make us so.
So, what makes us Masons?
What makes us Freemasons is our own personal striving to be better in the future than we were in the past. Our work to refine our own rough ashlar so that it can more resemble a perfect ashlar.
It is important to note that perfection doesn’t make us a Mason. For perfection is an unattainable goal. We are human, and only the divine is capable of perfection.
It isn’t perfection, it is the striving towards perfection that makes a man a Mason.
So, are we?
Can we honestly look ourselves in the mirror and declare ourselves Freemasons?
Lots of us can.
Lots of us can not.
Through the years how many messages have we read from Grand Masters, Grand Lodge Officers, even our own Lodge Officers, extholing Masons to maintain civility and dignity on Social Media? Reminding us of our obligations to do good unto all? Almost begging us to not place the Square and Compasses on timelines full of anger, hate, and vitriol?
Yet how often do we see just that?
This morning I was briefly scrolling through Facebook, checking on Masonic happenings as I so often do. I ran across a post from a fairly well known Mason from another Jurisdiction. It was a post, as his so often are, encouraging us, as Masons, to strive towards living out our values.
The first couple of comments I saw were from Masons claiming that our Brother asserted a fact that he did not actually assert. He replied to each, patiently explaining how they misread his words. In his place, I don’t think I would have done so. In my view if a man has so given up on reality that he no longer bothers with reading comprehension he’s probably far too gone to ever reach with reason.
After that, it got uglier. Vitriol, anger, demonstrably false accusations.
No doubt, you’ve seen very similar things, most likely more times than you or I can count.
But that’s exactly what Social Media is designed to create isn’t it? It is specifically designed to create the strongest possible emotional response, and most often the strongest response is that of hate. Social Media was doing its job, and enriching those who control it in the process.
We can’t blame it on that though. Social Media platforms may encourage negative emotions, and they may make it extremely easy to get attention when one posts in a hateful way, but we are Freemasons. Or at least we claim to be Freemasons. We have agreed to live and act at a much higher standard than the average man. No one forced us to take our Obligations, we freely asked to place those restrictions on our own lives.
The Worshipful Master asked each of us during our Degrees, if at that moment we believed ourselves to be Freemasons.
I suggest that we ask ourselves that same question from time to time. Are we Freemasons in reality, or only in name?
One really easy way to answer that question is by signing on to our own Social Media accounts and reviewing the posts and comments we’ve made over the past month or so. Do those posts and comments reflect Masonic values? Or are they filled with vitriol, insults, and anger?
In this way we can know if we are a Mason.
I think some men carry themselves to Lodge and some men carry the Lodge in themselves. Some men reflect on their oaths, critical of themselves and others reflect on their oaths, critical of others. In a world of arrogance, egotism, greed and violence, we are preceded by generations of men who, armed with humility, civility and courage, call us to dampen the drums of war and division. Never in the history of our species have we had so much materially and never have we been so casual with our future, Mason and cowan alike. We can ask ourselves if we are Freemasons, but it is the future that will answer.
The question brought back some old memories - contrasted with present answers.
Let me clarify: in my Emulations-based Ontario ritual (The Work), we ask this question, and the answer is always a proud and loud "I am, try me and prove me, W. Sir!"
However, back in Hungary, in the ritual in which I was initiated, the correct answer was like "All my brothers recognize me as such, Worshipful Master". This version I found on the net, but if I translate it from memory, we used to say: My apprentice and fellowcraft brothers know me as such".
The difference between the two attitudes should be obvious: I don't boast, I let others to judge me and my behaviour...