A Reflection on What Is Now Tearing Us Asunder

No other posts of mine have ever generated the heated arguments and hate mail - both reasoned and irrational alike - that this current controversey about homosexuality and Masonry has over the last few weeks. On Facebook alone, there have been literally hundreds of posts about it. 

The issue cuts to the very foundation of the fraternity: high standards of morality vs. tolerance for another Brother's faith and point of view. There is no easy answer, and I wouldn't want to be a Grand Master anywhere right now. No matter what decision he makes, in any state or country, a huge proportion of the membership will find it wrong. Brother is turning against Brother, and the very sorts of arguments our founders sought to avoid with their most basic rules are now playing out around the Masonic world.

I offer this observation for consideration by all.  Please indulge me for the length of it.

Freemasonry has always adapted over the ages, sometimes slower than others, to suit the society in which it has inhabited. To say that it has gone unchanged since "time immemorial" or other similar canards is simply preposterous. The medieval guild was bound to the Catholic Church. After the English Civil War, the Craft's stance on religion became neutral. The first Grand Lodge formation combined with colonial expansion to spread the speculative fraternity worldwide, and established a new and unique methodology of governance. The three degree system was established in the 1720s. After the American Revolution, territorial exclusivity doctrine was standardized. The two main Rites were developed and grew rapidly. The lodges soon moved out of taverns into purpose-built temples.  And the competing English Grand Lodges finally united in 1813.

In the era from the anti-Masonic period and the Morgan Affair to the 1850s, standardized practices eventually spread across the US about modes of recognition, conducting business solely on the MM degree, dues cards, and alcoholic prohibition. After the US Civil War, the Scottish Rite redesigned itself under Pike and became both esoteric and theatrical, and the Shrine formed to give Masons a place to go when the lodges stopped drinking. Then, drill team mania swept the nation in all of the American chivalric fraternal groups, and the Knights Templars grew by leaps and bounds. By the 1880s, a new fascination with esotericism expanded, and the Masonic Rosicrucian bodies were formed and grew.

Jump ahead to the end of WWI, and the fraternity had a huge growth spurt, resulting in the beginnings of Masonic retirement homes and orphanages across the US to give a safety net to members and their families that the government had yet to start providing for. With them came institutionalized charities among Grand Lodges and appendant bodies. Likewise, the Shrine founded their network of hospitals, at first to fight polio. 

Scouting became popular, and so the Masons started youth groups for their own children. By the late 20s, a massive building boom commenced in a very brief period of time, halted only by the hit of the Depression. In the 1930s, a wave of new appendant bodies like the Allied Masonic degrees and many others that we now associate with Masonic Week were rediscovered, grew, or were just plain invented.

On and on it has gone, with major changes occuring roughly every single generation, or at most two - from massive growth post-WWII, up to the wave of Prince Hall recognition in the 1990s, and huge die-offs of literally millions of members at the turn of the new century.

The growth of the Internet starting in the early 1990s allowed Masons all over the world to share their own Grand Lodges' similarities and differences even faster than ever before, and suddenly a US member in a rural town was in discussion with French and English and Australian brethren about their various rituals and practices.  The outgrowth of Traditional Observance, European Concept, and "Best Practices" lodges, along with table lodges, Festive Boards, and Chambers of Reflection, all came almost completely out of these Internet interactions.

Then recall the situation in 2002 when 14 US Grand Lodges withdrew, or considered withdrawing, recognition of the Grand Lodge of Minnesota over that Grand Lodge's decision to enter into amity with a second Grand Lodge in France - the Grand Loge de France. The resulting firestorm of criticism and de-recognition forced the hand of Minnesota, and a year later, they reluctantly withdrew from the GLdF again. There was really no compelling reason for those 14 or so Grand Lodges to even feign an interest in the issue, as Minnesota's position did not have any effect whatsoever on them or their members. Yet, they piled on in a matter of months, and Minnesota buckled very quickly. That whole set of circumstances happened almost entirely because of the Internet.

Unlike that situation, the current one we face now is indeed a scenario of "what happens in one GL affects all GLs". As has been pointed out elsewhere, both California and the District of Columbia have had to fend off public demonstrations against their members and officers, and they have been disinvited from public cornerstone ceremonies by local governments. I suspect this will happen elsewhere before this all ends. 

Nearly every Grand Master in the world was at a global Masonic conference this last fall in San Francisco, and because of the issue in Georgia, every single one of them (and their spouses, too) were confronted by screaming protesters and video cameras at their hotel and at the convention site, demanding to know why Masons discriminate, and what they were going to do about it. These were hard core, in-your-face types of demonstrators, verbally assaulting these mostly elderly gentlemen who tried in vain to explain they had nothing to do with it. But I'm telling you, virtually every Grand Master of the regular, recognized Grand Lodges around the world is now contemplating what to do about this issue right at this very moment. And I don't envy their decision.

Even international Grand Lodges are now getting inquiries about this, and few outside of Masonry completely understand that every Grand Lodge is sovereign, and that there's little that can be done to influence one in another part of the country, or the other parts of the world. Because of the immediacy of the web, there's no option of ignoring issues like this. Remember the racial situation in Georgia six years ago making the New York Times. And this current one in Tennessee hit National Public Radio.

A Facebook acquaintance wrote this comment last night on Facebook:

"The embarrassing inconvenience is that we are no longer living in an era where the debates within the lodge remained hidden. Largely, without the blessings of the leadership, and often in spite of real resistance to it from them, Freemasons, like everyone else in the world have migrated to the internet. And like everyone else, they like to discuss their favorite things, and their pet peeves about those favorite things. In short, Masonic business, while it may not be everyone else's business, none the less becomes visible to all and sundry. Today, the dust cannot be swept back under the rug. 

So, even if we look no further than among other Masonic jurisdictions, others will be forced to step up to the plate and make public decisions such as those made by California, DC, and Belgium because those obediences and Jurisdictions DO live in the 21st century, and cannot afford the repercussions that would inevitably damage them if they were seen to silently stand by. Such decisions might be acceptable in rural Georgia or Tennessee, but they will not fly in the rest of the world. The failure of Grand Lodges such as Tennessee and Georgia to realize that the world has gone on without them hurts us all. Failure to address it visibly and publicly however, is institutional suicide, at least for some Obediences."

No, we're all going to get tarred with this disagreement, I'm afraid, because the growing majority of people in this country equate the discrimination of gays with racial bigotry, whether you or I like that or not. The public's outlook has changed dramatically in just 8-10 years. Look at the political gymnastics of some candidates this year explaining their votes to strengthen the sanctity of traditional marriage less than a decade ago, who are now stumbling all over themselves to demonstrate that their views have now "evolved". Sure, it's pandering for votes, but that's how much and how fast the country has changed.

This latest issue seems to cut right to the heart of the most basic principles of morality of our members, yet both sides see it very differently. And it is not necessarily based on generational differences alone (although by and large, younger men see the gay topic as being no different than racial discrimination more than older members do). One side sees it as a violation of the rule and guide of their own faith as reflected in the writings of the Old Testament. The other side sees it as a violation of our first and most fundamental Ancient Charge against the introduction of religion and politics into our lodges and code books. This is not going to be a simple change. 

The Grand Lodge of Tennessee states on its website: 

"The mission of Freemasonry is to promote a way of life that binds like minded men in a worldwide brotherhood that transcends all religious, ethnic, cultural, social and educational differences; by teaching the great principles of Brotherly Love, Relief, and Truth: and, by the outward expression of these, through its fellowship, its compassion and its concern, to find ways in which to serve God, family, country, neighbors and self." 

If that is indeed the mission of Masonry in their state, how then has this argument come to tear apart men who are supposed to unite under the one single principle we can all agree upon: that simple concept that there is a Supreme Being who created each and every one of us, and through a belief in that deity, each man will find his own salvation.

The Grand Lodges that have withdrawn recognition of Tennessee and Georgia have done so because the anti-gay and co-habitation rules in those states have brought harm to them publicly and privately, both from outsiders and from their own members, and because they regard those rules as being incompatible with the founding premises of the fraternity. Other Grand Lodges may have a different point of view or experience, and may or may not follow the lead of California, D.C. and Belgium.

What happens on this current issue is yet to be seen. Georgia and Tennessee could change their minds. Or others could rear up in solidarity with those Grand Lodges and pass their own anti-gay, anti-cohabitation legislation. The saga is just starting. But I will end this rambling post by saying that my own experience at this year's Conference of Grand Masters was that most of the assembled Grand Masters strongly disagreed with Georgia and Tennessee, and were waiting to see what other states did before deciding what to do themselves.  They are deciding now.

That has now begun to play out. And in the end, those who will be hurt the most are the simple, rank and file Masons in the local lodge, when they try to travel, or when they are confronted with these questions by potential new members.

History is what happens while you're busy doing other things. We will soon see if this is another sea change in the history of the fraternity, or merely a bump in the road.

It will, I fear, be an interesting year for all of us.