Good evening brothers and friends since it is the new year I want to wish everyone a very Happy New Year hope hopefully it’s off to a great start thank you for joining us on our first episode of the year just to make sure everything is working properly with settings can everyone hear me
Okay very good thank you on behalf of the Rubicon Mas Sonic Society we are of course and always very excited to be with you this evening as we gather together outside of our lodges to learn a little bit more about Freemasonry how to better utilize the tools of our craft
Within our everyday lives this episode astonishingly to me marks our 55th episode of virtual Masonic education discussion since we began this series in 2020 which is entitled the 21st century conversations on Freemasonry for those of those of you who are returning visitors to our education we thank you and appreciate
Your continued support for Rubicon for those of you who are joining us for the first time we welcome you we hope you enjoy the education and discussion tonight and finally anyone watching this video which is being recorded and will be shared afterward please consider descri subscribing to our YouTube
Channel so that way you never miss a monthly episode of our Masonic education and if anyone has any interest in joining live you can attend in RSVP at Rubicon Masonic society.com RSVP as always I would like to send a very special happy New Year thank you to our lodge sponsors Lexington lodge number
One and the William aware Lodge of research for your continued support of rubicon’s masonic education would also like to say thank you to all of the members and honorary members of the Rubicon Masonic Society for your continued involvement and support as well alongside the executive offers officers of Rubicon worshipful brother
John bisak worshipful brother Dan kemell and worshipful brother Alan Martin my name is Brian Evans and we will now proceed with the business of the evening worshipful brother Alan Martin will you please do the honors of delivering the opening devotion absolutely Brothers Creator and provider of all
Things we ask that you bless our assembly this evening as we further explore Freemasonry and strive to build a better version of ourselves and do us with your Divine wisdom that we may be better Anda bble to cultivate the great moral virtues laid down on our Masonic trussle board
And improve upon everything that is good amiable and useful amen so M it be so M it be thank you brother brothers and Friends our virtual Masonic education aims to help us become better men always devoted to our family our faith in our country may we all come
Together to learn to subdue our passions to discipline our minds and to improve ourselves through the tools of Freemasonry any any opinions expressed during this virtual Masonic education will be those of the presenter or the participant they do not necessarily reflect the views of any Lodge or Grand
Lodge or the Rubicon Masonic Society by participating with us you consent to our guidelines and our full disclaimer can be found at Rubicon Masonic society.com disclaimer just a few more pieces of protocol before we dive into the presentation brothers and Friends these are not tiled meetings Masons and
Non-masons are welcome to attend and participate therefore please be mindful that anything discussed this evening should be suitable for Masons of all degrees as well as non-masons please uh have gentlemanly manners at all times no alcohol no smoking no no eating no foul language will will be permitted there will also
Be no discussion of politics or religion with a caveat for tonight’s present presentation at any time attendees may be removed if not following protocol in an effort to best assure that these meetings go as uh smoothly as possible here are some recommendations the recommended attire for each meeting
Is coat and tie please type your name and any appropriate Masonic title under your video to identify yourself to others if you’re not a Mason please simply type guest after your name please enable your video camera so that all attendees can see you please reduce background noise keep your microphone
Muted when not speaking please turn off all other computer programs to eliminate outside distractions and finally please be patient should any technical difficulties occur Brethren my name is Brian Evans and I am grateful and humbled to be the guest presenter for this evening I am the chairman of the Rubicon Masonic
Society I am past master of Lexington Lodge number one 2020 and 2021 member of the William aware Lodge of research in Kentucky and member of alal LOD number 222 in Washington DC hopefully you guys don’t mind hearing my voice for the remainder of the evening until we move to discussion question and
Answer and we will begin with the presentation Brothers the topic of this presentation is called faith and Freemasonry during this presentation I will attempt to address many topics and shed light on various questions related to those two words in front of you right now uh as I believe the answers to be uh
Any opinions expressed are of course my own any information and research found is of course my own and my hope is that at the end of this presentation if you are someone who is perhaps unsure about the connection between faith and Freemasonry then I hope hope that this
Presentation might provide a little bit more clarity for you as well I chose this topic for various reasons and in all jovial respect I’m wondering why I chose this topic after diving into it because this is a very difficult topic to put together in a format that does not tread on our
Masonic agreements to not discuss politics or religion because of course faith is a has a very religious connotation but faith is very important to me freemasonary is very important to me and I believe that both have and continue to be a very positive impact in my relationship with God my family my
Friends my business my acquaintances my life in general so I believe that this topic topic deserves a factual and well-rounded overview and discussion here tonight so I would ask of you please throughout this presentation I encourage you to prepare questions and prepare any comments perhaps that you have heard throughout this presentation
For discussion at the end um there are quite a few slides but many of the slides will go through relatively quickly ultimately what I think will be best for this presentation topic is after the information is presented with my opinion expressed that we really open this up to discussion so
We can have Lively conversation about faith and Freemasonry as you feel is necessary tonight some questions perhaps to consider thinking about are is there a relationship between faith in Freemasonry if you do feel there is a relationship between faith and Freemasonry how are those two related if you feel there is not a
Relationship between faith and Freemasonry how are they separate and can you have one without the other other or just a few for you to think about do have one rule as I mentioned before Freemasons don’t talk about poit politics or religion and today is no different however some aspects of
Religion must be mentioned in order for this presentation to reach hopefully some sort of conclusion but of course please be mindful and respectful at all times with anything you say on this topic although we’re going to be talking in thinking in detail about faith which has a strong
Tie to one’s religious beliefs I respectfully ask that we not go into any discussions whatsoever about any one specific religion of any kind there are thousands of religions Faith groups denominations sex Etc around the world and each one is entitled to their own set of beliefs and as Freemasons we all
Understand accept and appreciate that so opinions will vary many will differ greatly as to what is discussed here today depending on the individual and that is okay it is the beauty of faith and Freemasonry to have unique individual opinions and expressions of these beliefs and we should respect
Every ones no matter what they are this presentation is broken down into two parts part one is entitled context context is crucial when trying to research and understand a topic in order to formulate hopefully an accurate conclusion based on the facts so with context I will be going over perhaps a
Lot of boring information to anyone that might be a Freemason but very relevant relevant information to anyone that might not be a Freemason we’ll be talking about some definitions some meaning some biases some misinterpretation some Trends some patterns some TI lines resources Etc uh so we will now dive into part one
Context at the end of the day it’s important to know that words matter and for us to correct and for us to correctly understand each word as best we can if we’re going to benefit from this presentation or any presentation for that matter so I’m going to try to
Define faith Define religion Define Freemasonry as best as possible for the time that we have here today and if you have answers to these questions on your own please don’t hesitate to write those down we will open this up for full discussion comments at the end so what is
Faith well I tried to come up with my own version of it but I thought why not we just jump right into Google among many other sources and show you what the internet reads as far as what is faith faith derived from the Latin word fetus fi DS meaning to trust to confide
To persuade to completely to have the complete trust or confidence in someone or something to have a strong belief in God or the doctrines of a religion based on spiritual apprehension rather than proof so what is religion because obviously the two are somewhat related religions atmology come from the
Latin word religio and had an arrange of meanings including reverence for the God’s ritual and conscientiousness the exact atmology however is debated I went through many encyclopedias many dictionaries as well as online resources to try to find accurate definitions of religion and faith and I will tell you if you look
Through any Masonic uh encyclopedia or dictionary you will find pages that Define what religion is what faith is ETC so it is a very difficult question to answer depending on who you ask is Faith the same as religion well that’s another a great question and I
Believe it depends on who you ask there are over 10,700 answers to this question on Google and here’s the number one ranking answer to the question Faith refers to an individual’s personal beliefs and trusts while religion is a structured system of beliefs rituals and practices shared by a group of
People so only you can up with your answer to this question or any of the questions that we address here this evening personally I believe that the two are not the same I believe that faith is not the same as religion but throughout my research uh I believe that
You can’t have faith without religion and I also believe you can’t have religion without faith so what is Freemasonry well again according to Google and the Oxford definition and the results that pop up when someone types in this question Freemasonry is is the system and institution of Freemasons a
Freemason is a member of an international order established for mutual help and fellowship which holds elaborate secret ceremonies love how they throw the word Secret in there here’s another answer to a question about what is Freemasonry and I have quite a few more other answers to
This question in the next few slides so bear with me according to Britannica freemasonary is not a Christian institution though it has often been mistaken for such freemasonary contains many of the elements of a religion its teachings enjoy morality charity and obedience to the law of the land not bad I think that
One’s probably a slightly better answer in my opinion well what is Freemasonry according to Henry Wilson Coy in the en in his Masonic encyclopedia you can see there the middle graphic there is a whole page dedicated to answering this question of what is of of Freemasonry so
I’ll go through briefly for those of you who may not be able to read it on the screen the origin of the name is not positively known the earliest name for a Workman in stone was centarus the Latin meaning Rubble or small stones this appearing as early as
1077 ad uh by 1212 though that name or the plural CER was still employed a new term and many others that I will not attempt to pronounce go on to try to explain what a Freemason is so it’s even very difficult for Henry Wilson Cole to define a Freemason or
Freemasonry what is Freemasonry according to Robert G Davis in his book The Mason’s words Robert G Davis has probably one of the best definitions of Freemasonry in my opinion he says Freemasonry is the pursuit of that which is Noble in man it is a quest for intellectual and spiritual knowledge it
Is a journey to become aware of and be in tune with the inner nature of One’s Own being it offers a prescription in how a man goes about finding self-affirmation and fulfillment it articulates the nature of Truth it urg urges us to ask the deepest questions about life to contemplate what
Is important and to strive to learn more than we know and to know more than we think we can Freemasonry insists that so long as we never cease asking questions then it will not be possible in a lifetime to fulfill its Mission with us that’s pretty beautiful he does a
Great job excellent book the Mason’s words well according to citations in another book which is Joseph Fort Newton’s book entitled the religion of masonry there are many descriptions of how other uh Masons throughout time have defined freemasonary and they’re all uniquely different and they’re all uniquely the same so without reading
Each one I’ll just give you some some highlight points uh freemasonary is an ancient male Society moral philosophy free masonry is an art the active of the activity of closely United men who strive to improve their morals and nobilities it is science of life in the society in a in a
Society of men is a Brotherhood of Man based on ethics morals Justice and Faith it’s a friendship love Integrity which Knows No Limit or Decay and probably one of the most common or famous or inFAMOUS however you want to Define it is science it is a science of morality veiled in allegory
And illustrated by symbols so is freemasonary the same as religion well when you type that into Google you’re going to find 10,400 answers to this question and here is the top ranking and it’s from freemason.com which is the Masonic Grand Lodge of Ohio says is freemasonary of religion no freemasonary
Is not a religion or a substitute for religion however it is an organization of men who all profess a belief in I’m assuming it says a Supreme Being or God so if freemasonary is not a religion then why is is there and has there been so much fuss about Freemasonry from various
Institutions the number one source of confusion in my opinion is the original constitution of Freemasons Freemasonry was organized ized in 1717 and a book of constitutions was published in 1723 many of this like I said at the beginning you guys already know the first charge of the Constitution is titled concerning God and
Religion uh and likely the primary source for all debates surrounding Free Masonry and religion is because of this charge and it reads a Mason is obliged by his tenure to obey the moral law and if he rightly understands the art he will never be a stupid atheist nor a irreligious
Libertine in ancient times Masons were charged in in every country to be of the religion of that country or Nation whatever it was yet is now thought to be more expedient only to oblige them to that religion in which all men agree leaving their particular opinions to
Themselves and that is to be good men and true Men of Honor and honesty by whatever denominations or Persuasions they may be distinguished whereby masonry becomes the center of Union and that means of conciliating true friendships among persons that must have remained at a Perpetual distance so there are a few words and
Phrases in in there that we’re going to dissect first what is the moral law what is Anderson talking about when he says the moral law and there are many interpretations as to what this actually mean and that’s what’s beautiful about this presentation no matter what side of
The coin you’re on if you’re on a side to begin with is that we are all allowed to discover and determine our own interpretations of all of this and that is the beauty of faith and that is the beauty of Freemasonry and it is different for different
People some believe that the moral law he he’s referring to or it could be referred to as the Ten Commandments which is the moral law being the na natural law of all mankind some believe that it’s referring to the Golden Rule which in Matthew 7:12 States in everything do to others and
You as you would have others do to you and some believe it’s as simple as it is stated in the charge is be a good man be true be a man of honor and be a man of honesty which is basically saying no matter what religion you are a part of
You should do those things at Absolute minimum so what is a stupid atheist well probably pretty easy question to answer stupid is someone that lacks intelligence and atheist someone that doesn’t believe in God so a Freemason cannot be a stupid atheist and they must believe in the moral law what is an irreligious
Libertine An irreligious Li libertine is a person who is hostile to religious beliefs they’re devoid of any uh and ignores any moral principles they have no sense of responsibility and there are no personal restraints that this person has for those of you that have seen the painting keep within the compass where
There is the compass of a man in the field and outside of the compass and all the Four Corners there are bad things that are happening to to men probably one of the most perfect representation of not or or being an irreligious libertine or not being an irreligious
Libertine I should have thrown that picture up here but I didn’t what does it mean uh when he says that that religion in which all men agree well this is the most confusing uh and difficult to understand part of the charge but if we take a step
Back and if we look at the work from the time in which it was written the 1700s during the age of enlighten M the word religion was meant to be non-confrontational it was meant to be open to all faiths to Encompass the positive moral law similarities of all religions in
Which we all should agree upon which are true and essential for a good life so he’s not defining religion he’s encompassing religion anyone’s religion as long as they can abide by the moral law not be a stupid atheist or irreligious Liberty again these are my interpretations so let’s set the record
Straight no freemasonary is not a religion nor replacement for any religion freemasonary is not monotheistic atheistic or any other istic freemasonary offers no claims to offer salvation of any kind there is no holy book of masonry despite what you hear there are no Dogma or sacraments we
Do not do any type of worshiping during meetings we do not claim to have a god etc etc etc I’m preaching to the choir I know but all the allegations say this they say according well this is not what they say according to them being ignorant judgmental and
Uninformed that’s what I say Freemasonry they say is a it is a religion it’s because of secret meetings that they have they have secret passwords and handshakes it’s bad because they have gruesome penalties it’s bad because they swear Oaths it’s bad because it’s been condemned by Many religious leaders
Throughout time it’s bad because it’s Enlightenment thinking it’s a religion of naturalism it has satanic intents it denies Jesus Christ it’s bad because it uses strange symbols and modernist thinking it’s bad because it has religious doctrines it’s bad because it brings men from Darkness to light it’s bad because it has its own
God the great architect of the universe it’s bad because it has Masonic prayers it’s bad because the third degree represents Resurrection it’s bad because it has sacraments and dogmas it’s bad because Grand lodges act as magisterial bodies over its members that’s what I say to that every single one of those absolutely
False 100% false but that’s what we hear that’s what people say they’re allowed to speak their opinion but honestly if anyone is serious to learn more about this here are some excellent books that I highly recommend because the truth is not hard to find if you want to find the truth
First book is called is it true what they say about Freemasonry by art by Art de HOAs and Brent s Brent Morris the next one is the religion of masonry by Joseph Fort Newton the religion in which all men agree by David hacket now I know what
You’re thinking it says religion in the title of the book well obviously then masonry is a religion remember what we talked about when we were dissecting the words inside of the charge but it’s up for you to make your own interpretations to do that you need to read the
Book workman unashamed by Christopher Hafner a Pilgrim’s Path by John J Robinson if any of you have doubts or concerns or questions or unsure about this topic regarding faith and Freemasonry religion and Freemasonry anything uh about the that line of thinking these are the books you need to
Have you need to read you need to understand and there are many many more but these are the ones that are great to start with so a brother of ours Mark TW he said it best he said a lie can travel Halfway Around the World why the truth is still putting on its
Boots and that quote is more accurate today with our social media times and the internet than it has ever been before so this is an uphill battle Mark Twain knew it from the beginning if only he could see how right he was now if you’re interested in in better
Understanding the timeline of of lies and false indoctrination and the anti-masonry stories Etc then this is probably one of the best um uh overviews of what of what how that is explained so is it true what they say about masonry chapter two obviously you should read the whole book but chapter
Two goes specific specifically into a timeline of activities and I was going to put that here on this presentation but I I don’t want to drag this out with with too much of me reading slides all right so that concludes part one so part two now we’re going to get into some
Juicy stuff really start to think now all right this is where I want you to think and try to come up with answers to your questions or questions or comments so part two is entitled parallels as we continue with part two I believe that you’re going to see that there are many
Parallels between faith and Freemasonry no matter how you define either one so first and foremost it’s interesting I well as I was coming up with this it just kind of fell into place so faith in Freemasonry equals parallel geometry so as you probably know the term parallel is a geometry
Term where two lines are in parallel with each other but these two lines they never intersect and they never conflict with each other ever so it’s my belief and in a way to put this in a in a in a in a format that hopefully is as easy to understand as
Possible based on my opinions it is my belief that faith and Freemasonry are best viewed and understood understood as two parallel lines their meaning and purpose are very similar and closely aligned yet neither one ever crosses over or conflicts with the other and I’m going to try to
Explain how and why as we continue but it’s also important to know that any opinions can be parallel on certain aspects and differ on others depending on who you ask and what you think so whatever conclusion you are trying to reach uh you can probably reach that conclusion with whatever
Thoughts you want and justifications you want to have but ultimately I believe that you will see if you are honest and open-minded that there are more similarities positive similarities in the two parallels then there are differences so first let’s talk about the parallel line of
Faith well as I was trying to come up with different ways to describe what the parallel line of Faith was here is what I came up with faith it starts within your heart it’s believing that no matter how many peaks in valleys that we encounter in life that we must always keep the
Faith have faith that there is a positive outcome and trust in God faith is a feeling that has many stages of advancement there’s Discovery there’s knowledge belief and truth so Discovery is you’re discovering perhaps Faith or what faith is or or how to believe in faith for the first time you
Start learning more about it trying to better understand faith maybe uh if you if if it if you’re relating it going to church you start to go to church to learn more about your God uh and then you start to become more of a Believer and you believe you have this belief
Inside and then that belief turns into absolute fact and truth and that’s what faith really is is about in the end uh Faith should regularly be applied throughout uh applied through belief in God in order to be more like our creator here on Earth faith has a deep sense of
Spirituality and thought faith is closely connected with one’s religious beliefs well now let’s take a look at the parallel line of Freemasonry freemasonary starts within your heart freemasonary is understanding that life is a constant Journey filled with many Peaks and valleys throughout life and to always put your trust in God and
Have faith and continue to improve daily Freemasonry has many stages of learning and tools to Aid in the understanding of oneself to be a better person there’s the Entered Apprentice degree the fellowcraft degree the Master Mason degree Freemasonry should be regularly applied and further understood to help us
Improve and get better freemasonary has a deep sense of spirituality and thought freemasonary has a very close relationship with one’s religious beliefs very similar now I wrote the definitions and I came up with the answers for each of these but they’re very similar so come up with your own and decide for
Yourself so now let’s look at Faith and fre missonary together and when we look at both them of them together it becomes very apparent to me that both faith and Freemasonry are religious are religious in nature and they are both an expression of religion but neither one is a
Religion faith is not a religion Freemasonry is not a religion both faith and Freemasonry are a belief and a hope for the assurances that we don’t see both faith and Freemasonry involve a constant Journey with no destination other than the only destination that matters which is the destination of
Heaven you probably heard many times Brothers say that freemer has no Finish Line well neither does faith both faith and freemasonary include methods of teaching they both include methods of learning understanding thinking coming together and improving ourselves through the tools of Faith or the tools of Freemasonry both faith and freemasonary
Are a reminder on the right way to live life you see where I’m going with this both faith and Freemasonry help our conscious and our subconscious to hopefully make the right decisions and hopefully avoid the wrong decisions both faith and Freemasonry require a high moral code of Integrity both must first be practiced
And implemented first in our individual homes and then in our everyday lives we practice free masonry in Lodge hopefully or at least think about it we practice Faith wherever one practices Faith Church Home Group studies TV faith and Freemasonry both are greatly influenced by Christian culture now that’s a topic that has a
Whole uh deep rabbit hole that you can go into but it’s true absolutely true Christian culture has a has tremendous influence on freem and Freemason has had a tremendous influence on Christian culture both faith and freemasonary are about trying to behave decently without the need for recognition or
Reward it’s about doing the right thing when no one else is looking we’ve all heard Brothers say that are you a good man both accept that we have faults and we’re trying to improve upon them yeah that sounds like Faith to me that sounds like Freemasonry to me we’re
All Sinners and we’re trying to figure out how to not be a sinner we’re trying to figure out how to not do the bad thing and make the right decision and most importantly both should bring us closer to God faith brings you closer to to God Freemasonry brings us closer to God I’ve
Talked to many Masons who have said that without Freemasonry they would have not realized the connection that they had actually with their faith it’s another way of understanding so few more interesting slides and then when I’m going to open this up for discussion so if the ultimate answer
When talking about faith and Freemasonry is to bring a person closer to God if there is an ultimate answer is it possible that there are more than one way to do this I believe yes and my faith tells me this in my heart and only your faith can
Tell you that in your heart if Freemasonry is another way to bring you closer to God and do all the other right things which got me to thinking there must be some other good examples that I could show here to help drive this point home uh are there any other tangible
Examples to expose the possibility of there being more than one way to do something well here’s what I here’s a few of them did you know that there are 293 ways to make change for a dollar the goal is to make change for a dollar there’s 293 ways to do
That did you know that there are seven ways for a batter to reach first base in baseball seven ways the goal is to get to first base there’s seven ways to do that I keep looking over here because you guys are on my screen over here you know there are 43 quintilian
Ways to solve a Rubik’s Cube all you got to do is solve the Rubik’s Cube and you win well all you got to do is go to heaven or do the right thing there are over one trillion ways to lace a shoe it’s a true
Fact a study was done on this like in 2014 there are over 19,000 possible combinations to the game tic-tac-toe and as I was tying my tie for this presentation I got to thinking wonder how many ways there are to tie a tie 1, 177,178 Brothers in conclusion there are multiple ways for
Someone to improve their faith to become a better person to express their religion and become closer to God probably infinite ways and I firmly believe that Freemasonry is another way to do that and I believe anyone who’s a Freemasonry believes that also and now I hope you
See and and and squash any doubts that you may have had because I had them too so brothers that concludes my presentation and I will now open the floor for discussion so worship brother bisak are you there I am here all right good good uh I
Feel like I’m just talking to myself the whole time so I just I need to have some exchange here um so I want to go to you first I’d like to get your opinion and I’m curious to know when you think of faith and Freemasonry how you how you
Put the two together in your mind if if you are to do so well I have to agree with many things that you said and uh we have someone on tonight uh who’s presented to Rubicon before Terry tilt and I’m very interested to get his take on this as well but I think
Historically if we just simply look at the fact that we placed oursel at odds the dominous dominant religious ethos in the early 1700s and that hasn’t stopped now we’ve claimed that we’ve been a religion we’ve claimed we’re just a handmaiden of religion and we have Masons the last three centuries you said
We’re not a religion and I think it’s as you said up to us to decide how this fits into our faith but if we didn’t have this policy of religious tolerance in masonry I I’m not sure masonry would have ever gotten off the ground in the
1700s unless it was grounded in faith uh we wouldn’t have the organization today I don’t believe it’ be a completely different organization yeah good point thank you John I’m going to click on a couple hand raised here um in order to make sure we have enough time for everyone so basically
You can raise your virtual hand you can enter your comment in the chat uh you’re more than welcome to just to speak up if if we have a pause and you’re able to do so so uh brother Victor uh you can go first go ahead and your muted brother you’re you are muted
Brother okay once you’re able to get unmuted um you can we can try again uh brother with your hand raised I don’t know your name but go ahead I’m sorry I’m Brian moris I’m from Nova Scotia Canada and this is my first time on uh this uh media and I really appreciate your
Uh your presentation tonight it was extremely well done well thought out and I enjoyed it thoroughly and I thank you very much for allowing me to be Al thank you very much Victor go ahead yes brother thank you and um I’m uh touched by the presentation lecture I’m thinking of
Spirituality um in a type of formula perhaps not really formula but in proportion numerator and Freemasonry as a denominator and there’s spirituality multiplied by religion because we can’t discuss it um more politics and Freemasonry and then denominator Freemasonry multiply by man and Freemason is not a religion of
Course we’ve learned that tonight um but an individual religious character can be a Freemason and and come across the three moral virtues known to be faith hope charity and so in faith um that virtue that in that virtue that human individual in Freemasonry is upon the first degree moreover the louder that is
Composed of many more stares besides Faith so terminally the human body um the human being is ingrained in moral teachings or lessons that are in scripture um and a foundation of society as well so it’s imperative he have faith and it also those stuns on either
Side um of the lamp of knowledge as to be a woman is Illustrated as well whose name is Faith and doesn’t another woman of three whose name is Hope and another whose name is charity and that’s proa perhaps a whole another discussion but it also immediately leaves to a totally
More interesting perspective when we are talking Faith andony um in contrast to the the scriptures um referencing Faith uh and so the beauty in this um homus uh balance of of the fraternity and what um it’s become since 1717 really brings a close look at and the filet Society story of uh that
Shared about members of the fraternity who’ve for a while known a mom who’s more than a good fellow he had a friend who’s Master of the large he was given a small position he climbed the ladder to he’s in the Master’s chair as a result ironically in my opinion um and after a
Year signally he had failed to put uh the craft to work and also to instruct them on whereby they might pursue their labors and looking a little bit aside from him there are those who he failed to instruct who are great examples of faithful people in Freemasonry for
They’re depending on the master of the large to instruct them on whereby they might pursue their labors and so faith gets very deep in Freemasonry um and we we have more than just scripture to suffice or survive on as Freemasons um in spite of what of course I agree I
Agree with you what you think is falce of what they claim about Freemasonry satanic Etc um with much more of of ground and Foundation to cover Faith um as Freemasons uh so when we’re talking about faith without discussing the religion we might very well be willing to talk about a context aside scripture
In which we can suffice faith is is is one of three women and and and the other two being hope and charity because then we can speak for faith not really about faith um rather you know she in that situation has the individual duty to
Identify with us um um who she is as a being and the scripture then supports her in a Divine way because then this Behavior she’s performing a work otherwise the faith is dead uh scripture tells us and and uh you know in a Divine way because uh you know uh of what the
Definition of faith is I think it’s got a lot to do with um faith and what it means in the first degree which is in the great architect and uh and with that I yield back and thank you no I appreciate your comments thank you thank you very
Much you know Faith you you think it’s something that’s just easy or fre just something easy but we realize how difficult it is to actually put it into something that makes sense and maybe that’s kind of what we’re trying to do with our lives maybe we’re lives should be easy we’re trying
To we may maybe we make it harder than we should uh we’re trying to put our lives in order interesting uh brother John Cameron good to see you go ahead here we go thank you brother Evans I I appreciate it um a noal attempt to uh to put things
Into perspective for sure um You Be You Begin by asking some questions now one of the questions was intriguing to me and I tried to formulate an answer and I believe that you can have faith without Freemasonry but you can’t have Freemasonry without faith so the broader subject uh we talk about
God religion is the third rail in Freemason and to follow up on your last U your last comment I think we’ve made it very complicated I I I I’m perplexed as to why there are many men of good moral character uh and and Faith uh that are refused admission into the into the
Fraternity because they don’t have a belief in God Freemasonry doesn’t have and religion doesn’t have a monopoly on uh on on righteous upright man uh and and U and moral character those those so I think this is my personal opinion that we are limiting uh the the experience of having
These decent men and I known a few that aren’t eligible or I’ve known a few Masons for years uh then suddenly they realized that they no longer have a belief in God or their belief in God wasn’t as strong to begin with and I’m not the question for me that I struggled
To be to answer is why why do we insist on a on a profession or insist on a belief in in a Supreme Being A belief in in um in God I can believe in a great architect I can believe that the that the world was created uh By Design not
Halfhazard but it doesn’t necessarily have to be a God in my opinion but so Brian I you’ve caused me to think again and I I’ve I’ve written a paper a couple years ago on the third rail and free and Freemasonry and the subject is is a a
Very difficult one and you did a noble job in trying to uh to put things into perspective and the context you provided so thank you I U I’ll probably have difficulty trying to get to sleep now tonight sorten some of my thoughts than you thank you I I’ll try
To articulate your question and provide an answer based on my opinion so basically you’re asking why can’t a man who’s an atheist be a Freemason if he’s a good man more or less is what you’re asking um I would say I think I’m welcome for anyone else to give their opinions
But I think without a belief in God and I’m speaking uh about life in general not freem without a belief in God what’s what why are we here what’s our purpose I I think there has to be something there is a high there has to be a higher
Power we are not an accident this is not an accident I think we have to believe that there is something greater than ourselves and part of Freemasonry is putting our egos aside and trying to discover the truth and better understand ourselves um free uh belief in Supreme Being is I would say
One of if not the core landmark of free masonry uh if you however you define landmarks so of course you’re entitled to your opinion but I don’t know if I would want a man that doesn’t believe in a higher power to be in my fraternity with me that they have
That otherwise I I just I think they’re missing out and um I’m not sure that’s a really hard question to answer I think a man has to believe in God they can choose how how do they want to believe but it’s they’re not an accident and if they believe
They’re an accident and this is just happen stance then I don’t free think Freemasonry is the fraternity for them brother yes I don’t mean interrupt I’d like to offer a thought specifically on this question if I may yeah please go ahead um I’m I’m to some extent I agree with the with the
The the original question um I I have many friends who are not religious do not believe in a higher power and yet they’re good people I mean they know not to kill people they know to look out for their family they know to to when they
Give their word they stand by it they don’t they don’t feel the need to tie that to any sort of of higher being they just see it as sort of a moral compass within themselves and I accept that as their way of life and I I I I don’t I
Don’t I don’t I don’t make a judgment on that matter with them I suppose I it doesn’t affect my estimation of them as a person um however um although I I have that view I I I I see that as separate from my view of freemasonry’s requirement of a belief in God
Um I am a little bothered by the interpretation that without a belief in God that no man can be held to an oath I I think you can be held to an oath without believing in God you just have to do it internally rather than basing you on something external but I believe
That um all of us as Freemasons believing in one God all wise all powerful communica revealing himself to mankind um all good left that one out sorry um it’s a it’s a commonality it’s something else that draws us together I mean that’s something we look for in the fraternity right is pulling ourselves
Together as a group um this is something from the very beginning that we’ve all agreed on this is something that has tied us together um as a common Bond um we can have relationships with people who have other interest other things but this is sort of one of our bonds um so
As you say I I see it as a a central tenant of fraternity it’s important to the fraternity it may not be as important in the way I view another person outside the fraternity but it’s important the way I view this organization so I see it
As as one of one of our foundations as an organization so I don’t I’m not just saying we should do it because we’ve always done it I’m saying we’ve always done it because it’s one of the things that we agreed upon in the beginning was going to be a common feature a common
Trait of our members yeah this is a very interesting question I if you if anyone else has comments or offers a a different perspective as to why it’s it’s not okay to have an atheist be in our fraternity please um please go ahead and chime in
Once raise your virtual hand if you if we have a lot of comments and if your hand is raised a second time I may not be able to get you so that way we can get everybody involved brother Matthew go ahead good to see you good evening everyone um actually
Hanging out my lodge tonight um I’m Richmond 25 um so I had some thoughts on um what a few of the brothers had said earlier I wrote some questions this is first time I’ve ever jumped in on something like this I’m a little bit a little bit nervous about open open
Speaking but uh I did write down some questions to kind of like get some gears turning on the subject because you’re talking about parallel geometry here as well and things that go together but don’t touch and so these are kind of rhetorical questions I I I guess but I
Think it’s necessary to get to my point but I while you were talking I was writing down why is it important to have faith or needed what happens in life that requires that we have it and when do we need it and what causes the lack of faith and can it be recovered
And as it stands right now I’m a psychology student I’m in in my last U semester of psychology and something that we talk a lot about in Psychology you know why it even exists is there’s things called major life events that happen so we have marriage
We have births we have deaths we have illnesses and sicknesses and um divorce hardships uh war and traumatic experiences and when we talk about faith and the need for for having faith or the point of faith is that we kind of you know when we get to a point where we can
No longer do anything you know and but just stand there um Christ even said peace be still you know in the midst of a storm and I think that’s why faith is important for this fraternity or for anyone that wants to be a part of this fraternity because
We have an obligation to help one another in this fraternity right and so the brother was talking about charity earlier charity is not necessarily just you know a a monetary value but it’s also like giving someone an ear and a teen of at that right so these parallels go together because because
Like uh in my opinion like charity is to be there for someone because someone needs you uh in the meantime if someone’s not there you have to have faith in God or faith of something that it’s going to be okay and that was kind of where my mind had went uh when we
Were talking about some of this and uh you know a brother had asked earlier like U why it wasn’t okay for an atheist uh to petition and be accepted and I think honestly because there are just some things in life that you have to believe in something and like you just go through
Life not believing in something and like really how can you help someone unless you’ve known something that you you’ve went through a hardship or you’ve went through an experience where you had no choice but to call on something higher than yourself does that sense it does absolutely it
Does um you know I was it reminds me I was talking with someone today I was really asking a lot of different people even not Masons about this particular topic just to get different perspectives and uh this person said to me said they said that yeah they recently found out
That their mother-in-law or someone decided to become an atheist and then someone else decided to become an atheist and and one of the reasons why they said they became an atheist was because if there was a God why do all B why do bad things happen you know why
Doesn’t the God why doesn’t God step in and and make things right and I was say I don’t have the answer for this but it reminded me of a story that I mentioned to this person of uh there was this Guru who was mentoring a student and a young student young boy
And he uh and they were looking at a um a caterpillar that made a cocoon on a tree and he said uh he said I’m going to let you take care of this this caterpillar now it’s going to become a butterfly and when it becomes a
Butterfly I want you to take care of it and he says now but the only thing I want to tell you is that when this cocoon starts to starts to open up and the Butterfly tries to get out and struggles to get out and he’s going to
Struggle uh want you to promise me or make sure you don’t help the help the caterpillar or the butterfly break out that’s the only thing I ask and then once the butterfly comes out bring him back to me so um couple days later the the boy uh sees that the Cocoon is
Starting to break out there’s a butterfly inside it’s trying really hard to get out for for minutes and then minutes go on to hours and this butterfly is not coming out so next thing you know the boy says you know what I’m going to help this I’m going to
Help this this this butterfly break out from his cocoon and he did so we helped the butterfly the butterfly came out started flapping its wings a little bit and fell to the ground and died so he brought the butterfly back to the guru and the guru said did you help
The butterfly get out of his cocoon he says I did he said you know why I asked you not to do that he says no I don’t know so the answer is because the butterfly has to do that it has to struggle and build up its strength in
Order to break out of the Cocoon so that way when he builds up his strengths he has the ability to fly so that struggle is what makes him stronger and better it’s a pretty interesting observation to to a question about atheism but I believe there is some truth to that and
Every bad thing that if you look back probably made you stronger in some way and prepared you somehow for the future um so anyway that was a random side topic uh brother Mike go ahead brother Mike Mosley go ahead good evening thank you for the opportunity to
Speak I have I have two different topics I’d like to discuss I I want to thank you for your um showing us multiple ways to achieve goals and I wrote myself a note so I can use this in educational sessions in my Lodge later but Faith Freemason religion Etc should be viewed
As differences in achieving the same or similar goals instead of being right or wrong the other thing I’d like to say is uh I was waiting to come down here to Arizona from Iowa and to pass the time my wife and I have been watching rer of Northern Exposure and the gentleman who
Plays Chris in the morning had a very interesting quote that he read and it as with regard to why are we here strange is our situation here upon Earth each of us comes for a short visit not knowing why yet sometimes seing to Divine a purpose from the standpoint of daily
Life however there is one thing we do know that man is here for the sake of other men Above All For Those upon whose smile and well-being our own happiness depends and also for the countless unknown Souls with whose fate we are connected by a bond of
Sympathy many times a day I realize how much my own outer and inner life is built upon the labors of my fellow men both living and dead and how ear earnestly I must exert myself in order to give in return as much as I have received and that’s a quote from Albert
Einstein great well said good thank you for the time tonight oh thank you for sharing uh brother Darren I’m very curious to hear what you have to say because I know you You’ very outspoken you’ve got you have done your own presentations about this topic so let me
Have it how bad did I mess it up yeah can you hear me no I think you did a fantastic job can you hear me okay yeah you’re good yeah I thought it the the structure was fantastic I really liked how you did the uh second section on the
Parallels with parallel geometry and the reaching Solutions I thought that was fantastic metaphor there I wanted to go in make one quick comment on something from the first section and then a follow-up question if I can so my first section when you uh laid out that section thate that U that reading from
The uh the Constitutions Anderson’s constitutions that section is has baffled me and and intrigued me ever since I became a Freemason for exact reasons that you said and and I think you’re right that critics you know I focus my presentation on the Catholic Church alone they’re clearly not the
Only ones out there that that criticize us but um they tend to focus on that kind of earlier Parts but the very last line I think is incredibly important and shows why we are tolerant of other faiths is that theana who would elsewise remain at a Perpetual distance that’s
The important element of of that that paragraph I think just wanted to share that to you then I had a follow-up question around that kind of same discussion on this idea of irreligious Libertines that’s a one of my favorite quotes I remember learning the the obligation as an EA and that one cracked
Me up uh I was just like when can I ever say that in real life but uh and and I hope that this is going to be this question this is a question that I have related to that you mentioned that most warville brother Terry Tilton is on with
Us and I want to hear his his thoughts on this from based on his inter his presentation that he did last year I would think that he would describe an irreligious libertine as a deist as deest being one of these irreligious Libertines at least uh that that was my impression from his
Discussion and I would think that’s very ironic if that is indeed the case so I’d like to hear his feedback on that because if that’s the case then the Catholic church is basically yelling at us for no reason but just back to my original talk but that’s all had to
Offer and U and thanks for the talk Brian it was fantastic thank you thank you brother I think anybody that wants to really go down that that rabbit hole of the Catholic church in Freemasonry you can go down it and there is information there and it probably spawns
From something that wasn’t even related to religion to begin with uh Financial um and other matters so um it’s interesting I I would recommend finding the answers in some of those books I think you’ll enjoy it uh worship brother Terry Tilton are you on would you like to
Respond I don’t see him Darren is he on still while we’re waiting to see brother Victor go ahead please um thank you brother I think um just ice breaker to my comment if just uh hypothetical perhaps I hope it’s not so God for atheist um ideally this idea
I’m not atheist and I don’t know what that experience is like but as just a human being in the universe of some Creator Supreme Being um I I understand that the reason to go into who’s born atheist but to convert so to speak to atheism because there’s a belief that
God has failed somehow and then it becomes pretty baffling to me that um there’s a need to convert to something that says there is no God based on the god who’s become the failure so I find atheism pretty useless actually and there’s no need to really change into
Not having a God if your reason to go become an atheist is because God has failed so you become a belief in no God based on the god who’s become a failure it doesn’t make sense either way um that being said the human must be self-aware
At the end of the day of its own cold Constitution um and Beyond the knowledge of others in the higher maners of human form but related in the language that we use we’ve got to find a different layer each person where we are connected with others um and because the physical body
And the spiritual body uh they um they’re to be known through a spiritual knowledge here on Earth um among others and the Brotherhood and and needing some epistemological approach to um gain the C of constitution of the human being so there is space then for Theory um uh of knowledge and an open
Mind to the world um via language which gives us a perspective for Brotherhood and and a relationship with others and that practice induces faith and there’s no way to escape the grand the great architect or Supreme Being in that manner so I don’t really understand what what purpose um philosophically Atheist
Atheism is um because it it’s it’s not going to escape that individual that that psychology is not going to be enough to escape what faith is and as a foundation I you back yeah thank you yeah you mentioned the great architect of the universe which just made me think
During part of the the preparing for this presentation that one of the other um one of the objections is that well freemasonary has a God we have our own God called the Great architect of the universe well that’s not true at all because if we had a God God would have a
Name not the it wouldn’t be the something it would be God his name so I think that’s just another another one of those silly things um the almighty you know so um another thing I want to and David I’ll get to you in a second Masonic prayer let’s talk about Masonic
Prayer for a second well why is our prayer Masonic well it’s Masonic probably because uh we don’t incorporate God we say the great architect of the universe we we remain non-denominational in our prayers and that’s the extent of our worship if you want to call it worship it’s not worship it’s just
Prayer opening and prayer closing and uh if you think about it if that was bad and if that was considered worship then the US Congress every time that they prayer Pray before opening session would be that would be considered worship as well so we’re just having prayer before
And after and maybe Alan get your thoughts on that too when you have a moment about prayer specifically uh but I wanted to throw that that side thought in um Brother David go ahead yeah just a couple of thoughts um you know one of the things I always find
Interesting when we start talking about faith in religion is uh and part of probably one of the reasons we’re encouraged not to speak about it is that there is this tendency to try to interpret somebody else’s beliefs faith and so forth and and I kind of see this
Isn’t a judgment but I kind of see that when we start discussing why would someone be an atheist there’s no way for us to be in their shoes to know what they’re thinking so you know beyond pure speculation there’s there’s no way we could ever know that answer um but that
Kind of relates to the the other comment that I wanted to make and it goes back to uh brother Darren’s comment about the IR irreligious Libertines and the the stupid atheists I I think you know the way I always pictured this in in uh uh
Is you know the how do I want to say this the completeness of much of the Masonic language to include everything every possibility and the way I interpret it was again much the way brother Darren did with a libertine I think being a freeth thinker and you think about an irreligious libertine as
Basically someone who has consciously made the decision to disregard the religion whereas a stupid atheist not just the way I again my interpretation or my definition wasn’t just in stupid being something of unintelligence but kind of going back to almost the Gnostic definitions of stupid being a you know
Just a simple ignorance of the higher Powers you know you’ve never been exposed to it you just don’t know anything about it so you have the stupid atheist who is someone who’s never been exposed and therefore basically never had the opportunity to make a decision on it and then you have The irreligious
Libertine who is someone who has been exposed and has made his decision again my interpretation I don’t know if there’s any any truth or accuracy in that whatsoever but it’s the way I’ve always thought about it thanks yeah no thank you thanks for your comment well
Said you know if you think about it talking about religion well okay well why do we not talk about religion the answer is easy because it’s because it It’s upsetting and it it can make people angry because we disagree but why but why does it make us angry why do we
Disagree why can’t we because it challenges one’s faith and each one has their own individual Faith so to say that faith is not a part of Freemasonry makes absolutely no sense it’s absolutely a part of Freemasonry but we maintain Harmony by not going into the details and comparing or describing or pointing
Fingers at Faith or their faith brother Allen worship brother Allen would you mind maybe talking a little bit more about your thoughts on Masonic prayer and anything else that you think might be relevant well first um I’d like to thank you for the for your presentation tonight um difficult topic to to present
And and we have seen the different individual thoughts on the topic and that’s one of the reasons why we don’t discuss it in Lodge is because of the differences that we may hold um on theic prayer um Freemasonry uh does not pray to um a specific God that’s the that’s
The nature of the utilization of a allinclusive in Universal acceptance by using the grand architect of the Universe um it doesn’t lend itself to any particular Creed but allows those that do have a belief in that higher power the Creator that that organized and facilitated and made what we are
As um a constituent of nature to be able to practice practice that um and apply the principles that are taught within our fraternity to um work towards the truth of that nature so that would be my take on Masonic prayer thank you thank you brother brother Jerry good to see
You brother Brian great presentation um with regard to um men of face and Lodge uh there was a quotation that that uh has always struck me um it’s it’s by Christ F hner uh he wrote in Workman un a sham if you can indulge me I’d like to just read it please yeah
Okay uh he writes now imagine me standing in Lodge with my head bowed in prayer between brother Muhammad bakari and brother Arjun Milani to neither of them is the great architect of the universe perceived as a Holy Trinity to brother Baki he has been revealed as Allah to brother Milani he has probably
Perceived as Vishnu since I believe that there is only one God I am confronted with three possibilities they are praying to the devil while I am praying to God they are praying to nothing as their gods do not exist or they are praying to the same
God as I yet their understanding of his nature as partly incomplete as indeed is my own and that last uh bit comes from 1 Corinthians 13:12 and he continues to write it is without hesitation that I accept the third possibility and I and fully agree with
That and it’s always struck me as a very um descriptive um ring of of how we conduct ourselves in L that’s fascinating so what was the actual part of scripture First Corinthians where did that start and end U was that they are PR same God as I yet
Their understanding of his nature is in is partly incomplete as is indeed my own and that comes from 1 Corinthians uh 13:12 that’s great beautiful you know and I think anyone who is anti- masonary can easily find scripture that says the opposite and that’s one of the challenging things
Also about our faiths whatever religion it is that our holy book sometimes is confusing as heck you know so that’s also I think why the moral law takes a precedence here in its description because you know if you’re being a good person or not or trying to be if you’re being honest and
Truthful and have integrity uh Patrick go ahead good evening good people um brother Evans really enjoys your uh your presentation um one thing in particular I wanted to kind of bring up is let’s say for example the the parallel that you said between faith and religion right this guy’s trying to get
Up here let me just let him let him join the meeting real quick so with within with then faith and religion so one of the things that I experienced a while back uh uh being a Freemason uh one of the things I like to say is Freemon is probably the biggest
Friend to religion a lot of people don’t recognize the idea uh that it’s supposed to sit in strength of your faith uh and of course there were some moments where I was going through not necessarily a test of faith but more so a test of my faith in religion right uh the
Institution uh uh the the the building and and the and the dogma and so on and so forth right and so during that moment I think for me Freemasonry was one of the things that kept my faith grounded as I went through those difficult times uh and situations and whatnot so that’s
One comment I wanted to make but then I have a question um a lot of the times that that I hear about uh uh the idea that Freemasonry is a religion uh it either comes from from someone who is not necessarily tied to a particular religion or if they are tied
To a particular religion in my experience it’s usually been something of the Christian faith right um my question is do any of the brothers here online have do you you have in your L have you had relationships with um uh uh Brothers of of a different Faith other than
Christianity who have problems with uh people kind of bringing up the idea that freemasony is a religion a lot of times for me in my experience that I’ve seen or heard it’s usually uh uh given off by someone from from a Christian Baptists Catholic so on and so forth and whatnot
But I wonder if if we’ve heard that from someone a different Faith before interesting question good question personally I have not everything I’ve heard is from Christian background um pastors and so forth and there’s a lot of it out there you know and it’s unfortunate that there’s so
Much hate in those presentations and so much division in some of those presentations it just it’s just wrong U but you know people are entitled to their opinions and we are of course entitled to our own anyone else have that experience with other religions or faith other than Christianity disagreeing with
Freemasonry it’s a good question Patrick if you um you come across anything any information about that would love to learn more to hear what you discovered thank you good question thank you brother crickard good to see see you hello brother Evans and all my other brothers out there thank you for this
Presentation so a few comments I don’t know if there’ll be a question there I usually just make comments but uh so when you in the in our Kentucky monitor so you look in the index you know God has referenced 59 times in the index so uh I don’t know why
Atheists would really even want to join our fraternity it seems like you’re going to be hearing a lot of things that you don’t believe in so you know and there’s two you know so I just bring that point up and you know and God has referenced quite prominently throughout it you know so
When you look at the our checker floor in our lodges you know in the middle of that Lodge is the Blazing star which represents deity and and some symbology about the floor is you know the black and white Tils represent prosperity and and life and times when you experience evil in Life or
Experience bad bad happenings but God is in the center and the deity what did I write down here the Blazing star is a symbol of Divine Providence or the Guardianship and care provided by deity so that’s that that’s a a very prominent symbol in our lodge
And my last comment would be is a Freemasonry has provided me tools to make my faith stronger all the tools and symbols that we have in Freemasonry point you to God and if you are open enough to recognize that it’ll make you uh focus more on God and so I’ll end
With this quick story you know the New Year everybody has New Year’s resolutions and I’ve had for the majority of my life New Year’s resolutions where I’m going to you know get healthy be a better husband uh work harder make more money I I’m doing these things my New Year’s
Resolution this year was to get up at 4:30 in the morning and spend time with God and then let him decide what I’m going to do instead of me trying to be God and determine what try to make things happen in my own time so I there was not a question in
There there’s just a comment but I guess the the comment I wanted to make is Freemasonry has provided me tools that make my faith stronger thank you thank you brother God’s got his hands full with you at 4:30 in the morning that’s for sure yeah he’s I wake him up and he’s
Like oh [Laughter] man good deal so Brothers uh last call any final comments or questions of any kind anything burning that you just got to get out there you know Roger you’re on and we in our Master Mason class we talked about this last Thursday because I needed some help
Trying to put my thoughts together so we talked about faith and Freemason in our Master Mason education class one of the questions I asked you I said is is is God tolerant of other religions and you had a you had a good answer would you like to
Answer uh thank you brother Bron can you hear me yes well I I think of course um and apologize a little sore throat I think of course that um being closer to God does make you more tolerant and this was this was a excellent com excellent presentation tonight and I had a couple
Other thoughts within that um I think were uh um kind of got me started in some comments but you you you started with with all the possibilities out there that you can get closer to God I I don’t think there’s a better foundation for understanding religion than our
Three great livs and I don’t think that anybody can really start to comprehend what those can bring you closer to religion unless you have a structured degree program and have the conversations like we were having the other night and um you know I I think you’re right too you said that Faith
Brings is is a personal relation ship and not just based on good behavior our fraternity has gotten itself in trouble in in terms of making itself good men and not focused on men becoming closer in their faith and better men and Faith truth faith does pull you in that
Direction and you you also mentioned something with your parallels that started if you want to become better and closer to your God true transformation is begins with then that change really begins with the giving or the serving of our hearts so I I think that being tolerant is something that
We as you said or as brother Jerry said I think option three sums up you know where we are with being tolerant of other religions thank you brother great presentation oh thank you thank you and I’m going to piggy back up another thought when that we were talking about
The other night was we were talking about various books and you brought up applied Faith which is discussed in great detail in the book Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill and that’s another thing we have to keep in mind you can have faith all you want but are you
Going through the motions or are you applying it and there’s various ways to think about that are you applying it to become better uh and so forth so um you know there’s there’s infinite information out there to to put perspective to this based on whoever you
Are um and and I think something else in that book I believe it was that one or by Earl Nightingale John maybe you remember where the greatest the greatest way to achieve happiness and based on paraphrasing the greatest way to achieve happiness is by helping others become
Happy you know it’s giving unto others it’s being completely uh unselfish and that’s when you really truly experience a level of Happiness that’s probably rooted in faith that you just can’t explain I can’t remember I think that’s in the essence John of success I think he said U your rewards in life
Are grounded in the service you give to others that’s exactly that’s right man you are just too good how you do it yeah that’s right was that in the essence of success Earl Nightingale it was it was brother Chad you’ve raised your hand twice and you’ve you’ve put it down
Twice so now I’m going to call on you and pick on you how are you yeah brother uh I’ve been biting my lip uh thank you for thank you for calling me out so Brothers I think that we have all of these tools already at our disposal
So everything that we we have that we consider ourselves technologically advanced as just within the last seven generations so Humanity has existed for Millennia uh in fear and and with a lot of questions and we we see weather events and thunder and lightning and floods and things like this and our
Earlier ancestors viewed those things as acts of God and perhaps punishments for for bad behavior and as we advance as as a species we we understand the reasons for those things but we also understand the complexity of the universe in which we live the James web telescope was
Recently launched and has shown us the unbelievable complexity of where we live and it has proven that there is a plan to the universe and humans cannot conceive of a plan without a drafts person of that plan and so a Creator is not a matter of Faith it’s a matter of
Fact fact there is a plan and there must be a planner now we we may not know much about that planner but we know there is one and as brother uh Brian you mentioned earlier today that there were thousands of religions practiced uh there have also been thousands of languages spoken on our
Tiny planet several hundred of which are spoken in America today and so of course there are hundred of words that describe an apple and every single one of those words all points to this fruit and so of course something as important and significant as God will
Have as many hundreds of names and so when we talk about different religions we’re really talking about different names of the grand architect and I think that’s what’s beautiful about Freemasonry is when we talk about the grand architect it ENC compasses all of those other names from all of these other
Cultures uh that we’re all talking about the same thing we’re all pointing in the same direction we’re all we’re all looking to our creator and and I think that’s the beautiful unifying principle of Freemasonry is that the mohamedan and the Christian and the Jew can all kneel
Down together side by side and we are all praying to God the creator of our of our universe of our existence and that unifying principle uh is something that I think other religions struggle with the dogmatic religions because they have this this concept of our path is the
Right path and the others are misguided and I think that’s very unfortunate it’s gone throughout thousands of years of our history it’s unfortunate that one of us has to be right in order for everyone else to be wrong but Freemasons understand that that isn’t true we’re all right and we’re all pursuing the
Same relationship with our creator very well said brother see aren’t you glad I called on you I’m not sure we are thank you very much for that input uh brother crickard you threw out a word search in the monitor well here’s another fun fact for you in the Bible um
If you do a word search for the word religion it only comes up six times if you do a search for the word faith in the Bible 458 times interesting any other final thoughts or comments Brothers before we proceed to end this excellent evening I hope all right well I’ll end with one
Other one other thought this is uh since brother Jerry you brought up a Bible verse here here’s one others I want to share uh James 1 ver 26 those who consider themselves religious and yet do not keep a tight rain on their tongues they deceive themselves and the religion is
Worthless so whereas I appreciate your uh your willingness to put put up with this difficult presentation tonight hopefully you enjoyed it and um we will now proceed with the final slides and closings of the evening next meeting will be on Monday February 26th at 7 pm and worship brother bisak
Would you mind uh announcing who our presenter will be yes wor Brother David daughter was on with us tonight made some comments will be our speaker next month uh David is the current Master of the ohioic research David you want to tell us what your Topic’s going to be next
Month excuse me thank you very much uh the title of the topic that I have G plan on giving is uh there’s plenty of room at the bottom and it’s really a uh an analysis of that I’ve been doing I’m a chemist by training and kind of making
A relationship to kind of our natural world and to make and uh some thoughts that I had on the organization of our lodges and perhaps maybe some lessons that we can take away from from nature in order to improve the way that we behave as Masons great look forward to it that
Sounds very interesting absolutely uh worship brother bizak while I still have you would you mind saying a few words about the files sure the files Society Brothers was founded in 1928 and today it’s an international Masonic research society and it’s the oldest independent Masonic research Society in
America uh it was started to serve the needs of those who were seeking a deeper insight into the history and the rituals and the symbols of Freemasonry as well as spreading Masonic light and if you want to learn more about the philis Lees if you aren’t familiar with it uh you
Can follow the link that’s on the slide and I’ll post that link in the chat room after this announcement if you have any questions please feel free to get in touch with me thank you thank John uh for those of you that are podcasters uh these presentations have
Now and will be put on a podcast as well so if you want to listen to those you can or of course you can uh watch them on our YouTube channel this will be shared uh later this week and uh we have completed the Rubicon transactions they’ve been
Completed for months now but if you are just now hearing or discovering them and if you’d like to purchase a copy of the Rubicon transactions 2022 volume one you can go to Rubicon Masonic society.com transactions there there will be some more information and a link which can
Take you to the uh the Amazon page uh and more information can be provided there but all proceeds go to support Rubicon so great information in there we’ll hopefully be coming out with the transactions too at some point uh and we will keep you posted when there is more
Information to share for those of you that have not seen the Masonic table of course we are uh proud of that and we encourage you to watch it if you have not seen it uh give us your feedback leave a good review on Amazon uh and
Hopefully we’ll be able to do a little more with that sometime in the future or something different few more slides Brothers um those of you who attended our fested board and Conference that followed this past late summer uh this video production it took a little bit too long
But we are uh we are complete with the final version we’re making a few little tweaks to it uh I think the feedback has been good we will be sharing that here very soon so stay tuned I think you will enjoy that very much uh the topics of the presenters were Andrew McBride
Joseph Fort Newton Dwight L Smith Thomas W Jackson uh presented by Andrew Hammer Dan kemell uh Chris hoap and John bizak anyone that wishes to support Rubicon uh will of of course uh accept your money uh with a smile so thank you for those who do support Rubicon we
Appreciate it Rubicon is a nonprofit organization any other final comments questions of any kind brother Brian this is Keith gunkle and I just wanted to thank you very much this is my first Rubicon Zoom meeting I enjoyed it very much and uh the topic was uh was very very thought of and uh
Uh I I was very insightful by all the brothers and uh I do appreciate it thank you brother Keith uh where’s brother Alan Martin Will You Deliver Us in closing prayer absolutely Brothers grand architect of the universe as we prepare to close our meeting this evening we ask that you bless us with
Perpetual awareness of the principles inculcated by aircraft as we Endeavor to fortify our ability ities to be just and upright in all of our undertakings let us always be aware of the blessings we have received and from where those blessings emanate amen so Brothers thank you all and friends
Thank you all for joining us our next meeting is February 26 7 P.M you can RSVP if you are not already on our list at Rubicon Masonic society.com RSVP appreciate you all’s time very much have a a great evening stay warm we’ll see you next month
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