Pro Grand Master Honoured by Grand Lodge of New York

The Pro Grand Master Lord Northampton was recently honoured by the Distinguished Achievement Award of the Grand Lodge of New York. The award was made in New York by their Grand Master, Edward Trosin.
    The Distinguished Achievement Award is the highest honour which the Grand Lodge of New York can bestow on any Freemason, and the citation spoke of the Pro Grand Master’s interest ‘in the more philosophical and spiritual aspects of Freemasonry’,his move to set up the Canonbury Masonic Research Centre, and his practical support in the founding of Freemasonry Today. It also mentioned his belief in the importance of masonic education and the premise that Freemasonry is a way of life.
    The award was made to coincide with the celebration surrounding the 225th. anniversary of the Grand Lodge of New York. In receiving the award, Lord Northampton offered his congratulations on the anniversary, and said ‘You make your mother Grand Lodge very proud’. He went on to say that history was important, but that we live in the present and must plan for the future. Regarding membership, he said ‘Englishspeaking Freemasonry has common roots and also common problems. Since the 1970s we have all suffered from a decrease in the number of our members. Numbers in themselves are not that important ... what surely matters is the quality of the men we bring into Freemasonry, the moral and spiritual lessons they learn from their masonry and practise in their lives.’
    In promoting openness we had been almost too successful and Freemasonry had been perceived as simply another major charitable organisation, with even our members at times forgetting the other two Great Principles of Brotherly Love and Truth. ‘Explaining Charity is easy, it has tangible results. Explaining philosophical concepts such as Brotherly Love and Truth is much more difficult because they can be understood on many different levels. We describe Freemasonry as a very personal journey of self-discovery leading to selfknowledge. It is a journey which aims to make the individual a better person, and thereby able to lead a more fulfilling life and be of more use to his fellow man.’
    He went on to speak of tolerance. ‘Developing qualities of tolerance, trust and discrimination leads us eventually to wisdom and Truth. Truth, our third Grand Principle, is at once the lowest rung on the masonic ladder when it is solely concerned with morality and the highest rung when it is considered as an aspect of Divinity. Truth depends on our sense of what is true for us personally and for that we must listen to our conscience, the voice of nature. The principles and virtues of Freemasonry as taught in our rituals have much to offer a society in need of tolerance and trust.’

Benjamin Franklin 300th Anniversary

Three centuries ago Benjamin Franklin was born in Boston Massachusetts, on what is today Milk Street, located in the centre of the city between the shopping and financial districts. His earliest days were spent there, but as a young adult he moved to Philadelphia.
    Franklin’s earliest association with fraternal organisations was in 1727, when he became founder of a non-masonic ‘secret society’ known as the Leathern Apron Club. Just three years later he claimed that he was planning to reveal all the masonic mysteries in his newspaper. Whether or not he was serious, in two months he received his masonic degrees in Philadelphia’s St. John’s Lodge, joining the very organisation he said he would expose. There he served in several capacities.
    Franklin was active in an early Grand Lodge in Pennsylvania. For a very brief period in 1749 he served as the Provincial Grand Master, making him the first native-born American to do so. Within a few months he was replaced by William Allen, who immediatly appointed Franklin as Deputy Grand Master.
    Serving in that capacity he played a major role in the opening of Freemasons’ Lodge in Philadelphia, the first structure built in America for strictly masonic purposes. Along with the Grand Master he participated in the dedication ceremony.
    In another milestone for the colonies, Franklin published The Mason Book, containing Anderson’s Constitutions, the first masonic book printed in America.
    In his long masonic career he assisted at the initiation of Voltaire in the Lodge Les Neuf Soeurs in Paris. Later he is reported as having been elected as Master of that Lodge.
    Ironically, despite his strong ties to the Craft he was conspicuously buried without masonic honours. Although many of the organisations to which he belonged were represented at his funeral, no one from his lodge was there in an official capacity. Many theories have been proposed concerning this omission, but the most credible seems to be tied to the split between the ‘Antients’ and ‘Moderns’. In Franklin’s case, he maintained allegiance with the ‘Moderns’, while his lodges and associates seemed to gravitate towards the other branch of the organisation.
    With acknowledgment to The Northern Light

Hurricane Katrina Fails to Halt Lodge

The Magnolia Lodge building in Biloxi, Mississippi, nearly one hundred years old, was destroyed by hurricane Katrina. A major part of the roof was destroyed, the ceilings collapsed on the second and third floors, windows were blown out and the interior of the lodge room was destroyed. Immediately following Katrina, Magnolia Lodge held a special meeting in a neighbouring lodge.
    Meanwhile lodge members have worked ten hours a day, seven days a week on restoration. The roof has been nearly restored, and the lodge room stripped bare preparatory to restoration. The walls are now bare brick and the floor is raw wood. The Master’s pedestal is a nail barrel, the Wardens use upturned rubbish cans and the altar in the centre is a utility cart. The lodge members sit on old wooden chairs from the 1940s. There is no electricity, so candles light the room and the letter ‘G’. The only thing that was not swept away in the hurricane was the mystic tie.
    At the lodge meeting in November the Brethren did what they have done since 1850 by holding their regular meeting, at which a 50-year pin was presented to a Brother who had been raised in 1955 by his father, the then Grand Master of Mississippi.
    With acknowledgment to The Scottish Rite Journal