(Death, Heaven, Purgatory, Hell)
Rite of Christian Initiation for Adults
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Christianity and the Lodge
William J.
Whalen
Jesus Christ or Hiram Abiff?
When a Catholic abandons his faith and joins the Masonic sect the Church
recognizes his switch of allegiance and considers him excommunicated. The Church
would be untrue to her divine commission if she were to turn her back and
pretend that her sons can serve two masters. Protestant churches which
acknowledge the exclusive claims of Jesus Christ and the religious basis of the
lodge follow a similar course.
We believe that anyone who has followed our discussion to this point will agree
that this is the only course of action which a Christian denomination can
pursue. The Masonic lodge may avoid anticlerical activities in certain nations,
may support commendable charitable undertakings, may disclaim its own religious
orientation. Nevertheless the Christian knows that he cannot worship the Triune
God on Sunday morning and the Grand Architect on lodge night. He knows he cannot
participate in religious worship with non-Christians praying to T.G.A.O.T.U. and
still observe Christ's command to ask the Father in His name.
Masonic friends may assure us that the lodge itself does not bar Catholics from
membership and that nothing detrimental to the Church has ever been voiced in
their Temples. This may very well be true, but it is quite beside the point.
Christians do not feel free
to become Buddhists simply because Buddhists may refrain from attacking
Christianity. They do not become Buddhists or Moslems because Christ, not Buddha
or Mohammed, is the Way, the Truth, and the Life.
For all Masonry cares the Bible might never have been written, the Second Person
of the Blessed Trinity never have become man or died for man's sins, never have
instituted the sacraments or established a Church. Masonry relegates these to
the categories of "sectarian" and "peculiar" dogmas and those who believe in
them are warned not to drag them into the Temples of Masonry's universal
religion. Masonry carries man back to a pre-Christian reliance on human reason
alone with absolutely no reference to the Christian revelation. We readily admit
that a belief in God and in the immortality of the soul is better than atheism.
Masonry, however, does not labor to convert twentieth-century atheists and
agnostics to theism; the lodge offers Christian men a pre-Christian religious
worship, theology, and morality.
What possible advantages would a Christian see in the lodge which would induce
him to deny the claims of Jesus Christ and seek admission into Masonry? We find
a number of such advantages dangled before prospective members of the lodge but
none of these withstand examination.
In the first place, the lodge promises to make its initiates privy to great
secrets. They will be "in" while the rest of mankind, including most of
Christendom, will sit in the darkness outside. Nowhere does Masonry promise more
and deliver less; the great secrets of the lodge are neither great nor secret.
Are these the secrets of the universe? Are these secrets too blinding in
brilliance for the minds of women, children, and the "profane"? Are they the
keys to spiritual, physical, and mental happiness? Alas, they consist of a few
passwords and secret grips and ritual mumbo jumbo. The dissatisfied Master Mason
must be enticed by the carrot of higher and higher degrees to find the secrets
he expected in the Blue Lodge. He never does.
What is more, the secrets for which he has paid in the coin of the realm and in
hours of fruitless memorization are not even secret. He should have known that
real secrets in a mass organization of 4,000,000 men are illusory. Anyone with
curiosity about the subject can easily procure all the genuine Masonic rituals
he
wishes. Recently, a friend of the author, a rabbi, complained that he had wasted
evening after evening deciphering the King Solomon's code book for his Blue
Lodge initiation and did not find out until later that he could have purchased
the ritual in plain English at a bookstore a few blocks from the Masonic Temple.
It happens that publishers and vendors of Masonic books, like their profane
colleagues, are in business to make money and not to preserve inconsequential
lodge secrets.
Other candidates for the lodge are attracted by the promise of preference. Once
they become eligible to wear the Masonic ring or lapel button certainly their
business will pick up, they will sell more life insurance, they will gain more
patients or clients. Perhaps if they get into legal difficulties they will find
a brother Mason on the bench or in the jury box. And should they decide to run
for public office they will enjoy the electoral support of their brethren of the
white apron.
A minute's analysis will destroy this illusion. In many communities,
particularly in the Eastern part of the country, the Mason who flaunts his
affiliation may well antagonize as many customers and voters as he expects to
win. In many Southern communities where most white Protestant bourgeoisie are
already members, he cannot expect such preferential treatment since most of his
competitors also wear the square and compass. Elsewhere the Mason may find some
doors open to him which would have otherwise remained shut and he may pick up a
few votes which would have gone to the opposition candidate. He would be foolish
to think, however, that more than a handful of Americans make it a practice to
investigate lodge membership in their complex daily activities. Will the 32nd
degree Mason who sells tainted meat or weighs his thumb with the pork chops
continue to attract his lodge brothers to his shop? Will the bleeding victim of
the highway accident seek the proper password from the physician who comes to
his aid? Will the Mason be happy to pay $100 extra to buy his next Ford from the
Worshipful Master? Will General Motors or RCA pay a higher dividend to
stockholders who belong to the lodge? And do normal people stop to debate:
"Between two men of equal ability, I will choose the one who belongs to the same
lodge as I do." No one need fear that if he gives a good haircut, sells
merchandise of quality, writes readable magazine articles, serves a tasty meal
he will suffer in his business relationships because he lacks a Masonic pin.
We do not wish to deprecate Masonic benevolence, another so called advantage to
membership, but we feel we should again stress that there is no comparison
between the charity of the Christian churches and that of the lodge. While the
lodge carefully limits its disbursements to those who are paid up members, the
Church extends her charity to all: men and women, young and old, white and
black. The lodge takes pains to exclude women, children, Negroes, the poor,
crippled, and senile from its Temples. The only ones who are accepted for
Masonic membership are those who are most unlikely ever to need charitable
assistance "If ye love them that love you, what thanks have ye? Do not even the
publicans the same?" Anyone so foolish as to rely on the lodge for help in
adversity would do better to put his dues and assessments into insurance,
annuities, common stocks, bonds, bank deposits, or real estate. During a serious
depression Masons desert the lodge by the hundreds of thousands and the average
of $3 per member per year for charity drops to pennies. On the other hand, one
who is looking for opportunities to serve his fellow man need not look for them
in the lodge. He can find abundant opportunities in his church, in youth work,
in service clubs, and in similar groups.
Good fellowship is another promise which the lodge makes its candidates and we
will not deny that such fellowship flourishes in many lodges. It should.
Practically all the members fall into the same social class: white, Protestant,
bourgeois. Such jarring topics as religion and politics are outlawed.
"Nonconformists" may be disposed of by means of the black ball. Again, what a
difference between the exclusive lodge and the all embracing Church of
Christ which turns no one from her doors. What no one can seriously propose,
however, is that any man looking for companionship must find it in the Masonic
lodge. Even the smallest country village supports dozens of clubs and social
organizations which fill man's gregarious needs. A person can choose a church
society such as the Holy Name Society or Legion of Mary, a veterans'
organization such as the VFW or the American Legion, a service club such as the
Lions or Kiwanis, a trade union, and a bewildering assortment of bridge and
poker clubs, P.T.A.'s, discussion groups, Catholic Action organizations, square
dance groups, stamp clubs, etc.
Finally, some men are wooed into the lodge by simple vanity, by the opportunity
to claim grandiose titles, to command a respect that they do not find in their
own homes or in their occupations. Some find an escape from an oppressively
feminine social life in the all-male lodge.
Although we believe that Masonry ultimately undermines the Christian basis of
society, propagates an insidious religion of naturalism and the spirit of
religious
indifference, administers an immoral oath, and often engages in or tolerates
anticlericalism, we have a Christian obligation to love Masons. When we deny the
compatibility of the lodge and the Christian faith we do not question the
sincerity of Protestant Masons but their consistency. It seems that many of us
reveal a lack of consistency in many areas of our lives. We are scientific about
one subject and superstitious about another. We harbor mutually incompatible
political and economic theories but we compartmentalize our lives so that our
inconsistencies do not show.
Catholics along with many Protestant and Eastern Orthodox know of the basic
incompatibility of Church and lodge because this has long been demonstrated by
their religious leaders. We pray that those who receive no such guidance from
their churches in this matter will investigate for themselves the mutually
exclusive claims of Jesus Christ and the Grand Architect. "That all men should
honor the Son, even as they honor the Father. He that honoreth not the Son
honoreth not the Father who hath sent Him" (Jn. 5:23).
Taken from "Christianity and American Freemasonry" by William J. Whalen
published by Bruce Publishing Company, 1958