"To preserve the reputation of the Fraternity unsullied must be your constant care."

BE A FREEMASON

Thursday, September 17, 2009

How Dare Dan Brown Support Those Evil Masons

Now that Dan Brown has written the world's most anticipated book, and The Lost Symbol turns out to paint Freemasonry in a positive light, longstanding critics of the fraternity are working on their own lathered responses.

The British press, ever on guard against us wily Freemasons, now has the jitters over whether Dan Brown is lying or not. The BBC today has posted Can we trust Dan Brown on the Freemasons? The BBC's favorite Mason/Anti-Mason tag-team of UGLE's John Hamill and hysterical author Martin Short take turns batting specific passages from the Lost Symbol back and forth over the net at each other. This does, however, have the distinction of perhaps being the first article about Freemasonry in the UK that didn't use the phrases "rolled-up trouser leg" or "dodgy handshakes."

Meanwhile, the Catholic League can't believe that "Dan Brown Adores The Masons." Catholic League president Bill Donohue writes:

Dan Brown may loathe Catholics, but he just adores the Masons. “Brown goes out of his way in ‘The Lost Symbol’ to present the lodge as essentially benign and misunderstood,” says an AP story today. The Catholic Church, of course, is seen by Brown as essentially wicked and misunderstood only by its followers. “Masons are praised for their religious tolerance,” the article says. Somehow Catholics failed to notice: so abhorrent were Masons in their thrashing of Catholicism that the 1917 Code of Canon Law provided for automatic excommunication to any Catholic who joined a lodge. The current stricture in the Church, following the 1983 revisions to the Code, doesn’t mention Masons by name, but does retain excommunication for those who join anti-Catholic organizations.

In his new book, Brown defends the Masons against “unfair” portrayals. So kind of him. In real life Brown says he has “enormous respect for the Masons.” Must be their historic anti-Catholicism that won him over. Showing nothing but sweetness and light, the man who has made millions dumping on the Catholic Church says of his new work, “It’s a reverent look at their philosophy. I’m more interested in what they believe than all their rituals and conspiracy theories about them.” Now if only Brown had cut Catholics the same break.


Cry me a river. I was born and raised into Catholicism. I went to a Jesuit High School. I've been a Freemason for 11 years. I know the arguments, and I'm sure zealots like John Salza will come roaring out of the gate to proclaim far and wide why Freemasonry and Catholicism cannot be reconciled, no way, nohow. I know the historic battles between the two organizations. But Mr. Donohue alleges Freemasonry is an anti-Catholic organization, and the truth is that Anglo-Saxon derived Freemasonry as it is practiced in the US, Canada, the UK, Australia and the rest of the regular, recognized Masonic world is NOT anti-Catholic. There are Catholic Masons all around the world who know better.

In the meantime, I again restate my apologies for all those bad premonitions I had over this book. We all owe Dan Brown a healthy dose of gratitude. Maybe a Christmas card. Perhaps a fruitcake. I'm sending Omaha Steaks.

7 comments:

  1. Martin Short comes across as fairly harmless in the Beeb article.

    I read Donahue's nonsense this morning. At the time of Anderson's Constitutions, Catholics had very few rights in the UK. Remember that the Battle of Culloden, which resulted in anti-Catholic massacres, happened only a few years after the 2nd edition of the Constitutions. For an Englishman at that time to include Dissenters and Catholics in his organization, let alone Jews, was sticking his neck out in a politically charged age. Anderson was friendly to Catholics at a time where that could land you in prison, or worse.

    Pike, it is said, has some anti-Catholic rants, but the only rants I've been able to find in my limited scholarship were anti-Inquisition, or critical of specific Popes (before Papal infallibility), rather than anti-Catholic. He defends a Catholic's right to be a mason in his writings.

    Without resorting to Taxilation, how can Donahue defend his assertion that masons are anti-Catholic?

    ReplyDelete
  2. Chris, you don't need to send Dan Brown a fruitcake. He's dealing with enough of them.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Speaking of which, I see Watchy at Freemason Watch is accusing this post in particular of calling anti-Masons "a bunch of names." He has promoted me to the ranks of "Catholic Freemason Apologist."

    So, I might as well say that Watchy is a cowardly, anonymous conspiracy peddler who seems to have no other mission in life than to gin up lies and hysterics about the fraternity, while trolling for 9/11 Freemason connections, secret Masonic hand signals from senators, and pathetically incorrect guesses about famous evildoers and their supposed Masonic membership.

    He seems to have taken great glee in posting the photo of me in my Templar chapeau.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Brother Hodapp,

    I'm not so sure that this book paints Freemasonry favorably. To a Freemason reading the book they say to themselves "This is what I believe! So its accurately portrayed me".

    However, mindless criticism of our fraternity has been on issues of universalism, drinking out of skulls, "praying" in Chambers of Reflection.

    Unfortunately Brother, these people who read this book are fundementalists who see these practices as evil and Satanic. You may be surrounded by understanding, but I think most of us see this fundementalist as a friend, or fellow church goer who don't have the ability to think outside the box, but would rather roundly reject us as people for something they don't understand.

    As a fellow Mason, I found the book to be good and supporting, but I assure you if my Dad read the book, he'd have a very different opinion.

    So we are essentially left where we were...polarized.

    Brother Chris Peace
    Stony Creek Lodge 5
    Rochester, MI

    ReplyDelete
  5. As I was finishing TLS (like my acronym) I was saying to myself that the Anti's were going to start calling Brown a closet Mason or a Mason-wannbe.

    Mr Donahue I'm pretty sure hasn't read the Davinci Code or the Lost Symbol before making such remarks but takes most by hearsay.

    The conspiracy folks are gonna have a field day with trying to connect Brown as a Mason. It reminds me as John Robinson was commissioned to write a anti Masonic piece by the church and thru his research realized the craft wasn't the evil doing nonsense that the church paints as.

    Thank God some people have enough courage to speak up for themselves and not spew the same old crap over and over like robots.

    ReplyDelete
  6. I believe as a PRACTICING Catholic that all occults, specifically announced by the Vatican to be horrid and evil, are. Even Mother Teresa has come out and denounced the freemasons as wicked, sinful and destructive to ones soul.
    As I came across this website I was disgusted on how the devil could have so successfully warped your mind and spirit. That thing that wriggles in hell, in vain to destroy all of God's creation. I hope and pray that you can turn from your evil and sinful ways and to follow the one True God Jesus Christ our Savior. In the end GOD will destroy Lucifer. And all of GOD’S peoples that were faithful to Him shall be granted eternal happiness. Those that were sent into damnation shall suffer the eternity of torture, pain, hate, and sadness. Don’t fall prey to such disgust. For, because you are made in the goodness and likeness of God. He sent his only Son to endure all pain for our sins. I bless you all, love you and will keep you all in my prayers.
    Signed ,
    Sean Maelisa
    and.he.wept@gmail.com

    ReplyDelete
  7. "Set thine house in order."

    Isaiah 38:1, in case you weren't familiar with it.

    ReplyDelete

ATTENTION!
SIGN YOUR NAME OR OTHERWISE IDENTIFY YOURSELF IN YOUR COMMENT POSTS IF YOU DO NOT HAVE A GOOGLE ACCOUNT.
Your comments will not appear immediately because I am forced to laboriously screen every post. I'm constantly bombarded with spam. Depending on the comments being made, anonymous postings on Masonic topics may be regarded with the same status as cowans and eavesdroppers, as far as I am concerned. If you post with an unknown or anonymous account, do not automatically expect to see your comment appear.