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BACK NEXT Spring 2002 Issue 20 Letter from the Editor News Briefing News and Views On The Level International News Julian Rees French Freemasonry and the Resistance All Charged in the Deep - A Raising The Way of the Labyrinth A Masonic Gunfighter of the Old West Entering the Oracle of the Dead From Role-Play to Ritual Tales from the Crypt Masonic Treasures in Leicester Brother Lightfoote's Journal Letters to the Editor Review: Netherworld Review: The Victorian Celebration of Death Review: Preston's, Illustrations of Masonry Review: Verdi: Requiem Review: Beyond the Five Points Canon Richard Tydeman Copyright 1997-2008 FREEMASONRY TODAY Designed and Maintained by: Cyberpoint Limited

FREEMASONRY TODAY Spring 2002 - Issue 20 - Index Michael Baigent - Letter from the Editor Modern physics has provided us with a further concept by which we might understand our reality. There is a well known adage, used to explain Chaos Theory, that a butterfly flapping its wings over the Amazon might, by a series of cascading effects, cause a storm over New York. Now, there are a great number of butterflies in Brazil and not so many storms in New York, but the point is clear. Big effects can come from small beginnings. This brings me to the Pro Grand Master’s tie competition. You may ask in bemusement: what can sartorial variation have to do with anything? Certainly, meeting with friends dressed as though I am attending a funeral has always seemed odd to me ... News Briefing Robert Morrow: New Grand Secretary and Grand Scribe E — Masonic Declaration No Longer Specified — End of the Black Tie for Freemasons? — Freemasonry in the Community: Reports From Organisers News and Views Masonic Site at the National Arboretum — Derbyshire Province Donate New Lift for Hospice — Bursaries for Craftsmen in Yorkshire — Masonic Exhibition in the Chateau of Tours — Lincolnshire Charity Spectacular — River Mersey Inshore Rescue Service — Middlesex Medical Equipment — Support for Care Centre in Hereford On The Level Visiting the Suffolk Seaside? — Cambridge Masonic Sundial — New Life on Wheels — Support for Research — Canonbury Masonic Research Centre — Centre for Research into Freemasonry — The Cornerstone Society — Quatuor Coronati Lodge Seminars International News New Grand Master for Ireland — Photographic Exhibition of Grand Lodge of Russia in Istanbul — Masonic Art of Czech Painter Re-discovered — New Grand Master for Israel — Tomb of the Unknown Mason in Texas — New Funding for Masonic Research: OVN A Divinity that Divides Us A candidate came to be interviewed by the lodge committee recently, a man who was already well-known to many of the lodge members. One of the questions he was asked was ‘Do you believe in a Supreme Being?’ There followed a long and expectant silence, at the end of which the candidate said: ‘It depends on what you mean by believe’. In my view, he was right to hesitate. The question might have been taken to mean ‘do you believe there is a Supreme Being who orders all our lives and without whom we would be powerless?’ I know a lot of people for whom the statement implicit in that question is not tenable. To that question, for example, the candidate might have answered ... French Freemasonry and the Resistance The first active ‘Résistant’ shot during the Second World War by the German authorities was a Freemason. Brother José Roig was executed at Ivry, 1st August 1941, for supporting, and recruiting for, General de Gaulle and the Free French Government in exile. The French Government’s Act of 13th August 1940 ... All Charged in the Deep - A Raising “The three of us were the first to enter the stricken submarine, Kursk. For the Russians they were in the gloom at the brink of a grave that had entombed 118 of their friends and colleagues. I was carefully performing an allotted task, unique in human and technical challenge. A long long way from…” “So Mark, how did it all begin?” I was speaking to Mark Girdlestone, Master Diver and Mason, in his office at the back of the diving shop he runs with his wife in Brightlingsea, on the Essex coast. “I enjoyed my childhood years living by the North East Essex Coast ... The Way of the Labyrinth There is today a renewal of interest in an ancient pattern which represents the inner path at the heart of all traditions. For millennia people have laid out on the ground the pattern of a labyrinth, or elsewhere marked out labyrinth images. The earliest are prehistoric, but the most prominent are in medieval cathedrals and churches. It is almost undeniable that these had a ritual significance arising in prehistory and brought into Christian service during ... A Masonic Gunfighter of the Old West Gunfighters were as indigenous to the Old West as cattle. The more famous of the breed ended up becoming household names: John Wesley Hardin, Wild Bill Hickock, Wyatt Earp and Doc Holiday, to name but a few. Dallas Stoudenmire was a shooter and a Freemason from the town of El Paso, Texas, where, one week in April 1881, he blasted his way into history. This was his brief and violent moment of fame. Masonry had been established in Texas since the formation of its Grand Lodge in 1837. El Paso’s first lodge was founded in 1854; by 1881 a good number ... Entering the Oracle of the Dead The most terrifying and dangerous of all ancient rituals for foretelling the future was undertaken by means of the descent into Hell. This took place at the Oracle of the Dead, at Baia, near Naples in southern Italy. It was not just a poetical or mythological allegory: it actually happened. During the reign of the Roman Emperor Augustus, in the last decades BC, the underground Oracle of the Dead was closely packed with soil and rubble and sealed ... From Role-Play to Ritual Not long ago the Chapter of York Minster, the governing body of the Cathedral, decided that the time had come to replace the stone-work around the arch over the main West doorway. The figures that were originally carved there had slowly worn away. The scenes to be newly carved included the Garden of Eden, the story of Cain and Abel, the dramas of Noah and Jonah, as well as three scenes of our Lord and St. Peter. To achieve this end ... Tales from the Crypt The Grand Council of the Order of Royal and Select Masters of England and Wales and its Districts and Councils Overseas is more commonly known among English Freemasons as the Cryptic Rite. This Grand Council controls four degrees which are conferred in chronological order: Select Master, Royal Master, Most Excellent Master and Super Excellent Master. There are many masons who do not venture beyond the Craft, Royal Arch or even the Mark ... Masonic Treasures in Leicester Through Masonic artefacts, the whole spectrum of the history of Freemasonry is opened to us. Even a brief visit to any one of our many Masonic museums will transport us through centuries of our craft. The Leicester masonic Library and Museum is situated on the first floor of the conveniently placed Masonic Hall just a five-minute walk from Leicester station. The whole building has an ambiance of friendliness and when you enter a sense of serenity and calm descends. The first striking exhibit is a three-tier glass case along the left wall entitled ... Brother Lightfoote's Journal Sylvester, as every schoolboy knows, was made bishop of Rome in the year 314 and is credited with having baptised the emperor Constantine. Other than this highly improbable feat, almost nothing is known about him but that has not deterred a lodge of Freemasons naming themselves after him on the grounds that their inaugural meeting was held on his feast day. It seems odd to me that a lodge should meet on New Year’s Eve, but if one insisted on so doing, one might have expected them to call themselves the Auld Acquaintance or the Neo Annum or something ... Letters to the Editor Teaching Freemasonry to Freemasons — Enthusing New Candidates — Christian Freemasonry — The Volume of the Sacred Law — Restore Lost Pantheism — Honour Before Rank — Reflections — Riding the Goat — Mozart's Mysterious Death Review: Netherworld Review: The Victorian Celebration of Death Review: Preston's, Illustrations of Masonry Review: Verdi: Requiem Review: Beyond the Five Points Secrets? What Secrets? Every Freemason has solemnly sworn never to reveal any of the secrets or mysteries of masonry – but what exactly do we mean by that? There is no doubt that in medieval times the secrets of the operative masons were very practical indeed. They included the methods of proving uprights and horizontals, the knowledge of tools and their uses, and – perhaps the most important – the ability to make an angle of ninety degrees to ensure that a stone was square. These secrets took a considerable time to learn and involved a long apprenticeship followed by years as a Craftsman before eventually perhaps becoming a Master of the Art ...   Issue 20, Spring 2002 © FreemasonryToday 1997-2008