The Consultant

by Midnight Freemason Contributor

Steven L. Harrison, 33°, FMLR

Congratulations to Very Much Most Worshipful Brother John Henry Doe, who has just been elected the Grand-Grand Master of all of Freemasonry.  This is an opportunity he has long sought.  He's been griping for years about the problems facing the Brotherhood and now he, and he alone, has the power to turn things around.  So, now what?

VMMWB Doe: Well, first, I put on my gold jewel, gold apron, gold crown, grasp my gold baton of authority and sit in my gold chair in the East.  

Then what?

VMMWB Doe: Oh, you mean that isn't enough?  Well,  talk, as you know, is cheap.  So all the griping I've been doing has pretty much been hot air.  If I have real responsibilities here, I guess I'd better hire a consultant who has a track record of turning organizations around… someone from outside the fraternity who can take an objective look at Freemasonry and make recommendations in the unlikely event we're doing something wrong.

Accordingly, VMMWB Doe, after much consideration, hires the best business consultant around, Edsel P. Highpower III, MBA, to analyze the Craft and recommend actions for improvement.  Highpower studies the fraternity and reports back to VMMWB Doe.

VMMWB Doe: Well, Highpower, what do you think?

Highpower: I think you're nuts.

VMMWB Doe: Excuse me?

Highpower: Everyone says you have a membership problem.  Membership has been declining for decades and continues to decrease.  I understand you don't just want anyone to join, but, still, you really do have a membership issue.  YET YOU EXCLUDE HALF THE WORLD FROM BECOMING MEMBERS!

VMMWB Doe: Are you suggesting we should admit women?  You just don't understand us.  I can assure you we will never admit women.  What other bright ideas do you have?

Highpower: You lack strong consistent leadership.  Throughout the world Freemasonry is a conglomeration of separate Grand Lodges loosely connected, each making up its own rules.  It's even worse in the US — Fifty or so separate Grand Lodges sharing territories with fifty or so other Grand Lodges, some not recognizing others for whatever reason; and, frankly, a couple of Grand Lodges going completely off the rails.  

VMMWB Doe: You just don't understand us.  Freemasonry is a grass-roots organization.  We will never have a universal central leadership.  All they would ever do is raise our per-capita.

Highpower: You missed the point. Where is your single voice for Freemasonry?

VMMWB Doe: What about me? I am, after all, the Grand-Grand Master.

Highpower: You know very well this is a fictional piece.  Let's move on to the next issue.  This is not your father's world; this is not your father's Freemasonry.  We live in a world steeped in promotion and advertising.  It's everywhere.  Google isn't just a search engine, FaceBook isn't just a social network; their very essence is all about advertising.  Freemasonry does little to promote itself in a world that increasingly only responds to hype.  The public usually only sees stuff from places like the History Channel with overtones suggesting creepy things are going on behind Lodge doors.  You need to consistently, regularly get the word out about your real purpose and activities.  You need to do it in a classy way and not come off like a bunch of snake-oil salesmen.  To put it succinctly, you need a public relations program, and it goes back to needing that single voice for the Fraternity.

VMMWB Doe: Highpower, you really don't understand us.  Some of the stuff on TV and the Internet is such drivel it's not worth our response.  And we certainly don't like people who blow their own horn.  Advertising or, as you call it, promotion, is beneath us.  You won't see that around here.  Didn't you find anything I can use?

Highpower: I found this — most of your Lodge meetings are boring.

VMMWB Doe: How would you know? You're not a Mason and you're not allowed to attend our meetings.

Highpower: YOUR OWN MEMBERS SAY THEY ARE BORING.

VMMWB Doe: If our own members thought the meetings were boring attendance would be really low.

Highpower: I rest my case.

VMMWB Doe: Highpower, you're fired.  I don't need you.  I can come up with my own ideas to turn this Fraternity around.  In fact, I'm planning to introduce one that will be great.  I'm going to call it "Every Member Get A Member."

Epilog: After implementing his innovative "Every Member Get A Member" program, Very Much Most Worshipful Brother Doe continued to see membership decline, but at a slightly slower pace.  He counts that as his greatest achievement as the Grand-Grand Master of all of Freemasonry.

~SLH

Bro. Steve Harrison, 33° is Past Master of Liberty Lodge #31, Liberty, Missouri. He is the editor of the Missouri Freemason magazine, author of the book Freemasonry Crosses the Mississippi, a Fellow of the Missouri Lodge of Research and also its Worshipful Master. He is a dual member of Kearney Lodge #311, St. Joseph Missouri Valley of the Scottish Rite, Liberty York Rite, Moila Shrine and a member and Past Dean of the DeMolay Legion of Honor. Brother Harrison is a regular contributor to the Midnight Freemasons blog as well as several other Masonic publications. His latest book, Freemasons: Tales From the Craft & Freemasons at Oak Island. Both are available on amazon.com.

The Reports of My Death

by Midnight Freemason Contributor

Bro Bill Hosler, PM

There is an old story (which may or not be true) about Brother Samuel Langhorne Clemens who is more commonly known by his pen name, Mark Twain. Clemens was raised to the sublime degree of a Master Mason in Polar Star Lodge 79 in Saint Louis, Missouri in 1861. 

In May of 1897 Brother Mark Twain was approached by reporters in London. Twain was abroad on a world speaking tour and a rumor was started in the United States that the author had grown ill and had sadly passed away. It has been said that the rumor had grown to such proportion that a newspaper published Twain’s obituary.  

When reporters approached Brother Twain about the rumor and asked the humorist for a quote. Twain told the assembled group of reporters, “The reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated.”

When I first asked a friend of mine for a petition to become a Freemason, I was invited to attend dinner with the Brethren of my future Mother Lodge. The members of the lodge were hosting the Brethren of our sister lodge in Canada. Each year the two lodges gathered together, one year in the United States and the next year in Canada, to spread the cement of Brotherly love. 

As I sat down to a wonderful meal of Hoosier style beef and noodles, one of the Brethren, an outspoken Past Master, piped up and said, “I don't know why you are joining the Masons. The Fraternity will be dead in five years anyway.” 

Of course, his statement shocked me. At that moment of my life, I knew absolutely nothing about the organization. For my entire adult life, I had seen the windowless high-rise building downtown, the one I was currently eating dinner in, and never given a moment of thought to the possibility that the organization may have had membership problems. I ignored the man’s declaration and progressed through the degrees to become a Master Mason. 

That dinner I attended is now thirteen years in the past, and our beloved Craft is still at labor many years after my Brother's prediction. Recently while reading social media I've seen many Brothers who, in their frustration with the direction of Masonry, have been making the same declaration: “Masonry is dead!”

As a member who has been fighting with the establishment since my raising, I truly understand the frustration these Brothers are laboring under; the slow progress of change (please pardon my use of that dirty word) can be quite frustrating. But I truly believe, as in the case of the reports of Brother Twain’s demise, the reports of our beloved fraternity’s death have been “greatly exaggerated”.

The year I became a Mason (2002), many lodges were merging with other lodges, or just surrendering their charters to their Grand Lodges.  Buildings were being sold to developers or given to local municipalities.  It was a sad time for our gentle Craft. There was one lodge in the Masonic Temple where my lodge met that had to call a Past Master of the lodge to come from his home to sign the book in order to have the minimum number of members to open a lodge in our jurisdiction. It was looking dim for the members of most lodges. 

Since those dark days, many young men have discovered Freemasonry through the writings of Dan Brown. Brown made us look cool and relevant, not just a bunch of old men arguing over fish fries and pancakes.

Even though I still get frustrated myself with the glacier-like slowness that our fraternity moves in, I can say without hesitation that even though the movement is slow, we are still moving. 

Today, more lodges are including Masonic Education into their meetings, and more Grand Lodges have voted to allow subordinate lodges to open on the Entered Apprentice degree. We have even seen some lodges vote to raise dues to common sense amounts (no elderly Brethren on fixed incomes were harmed during this staggeringly significant event). Although we still have a way to go, the fact is that we are making progress.

As long as we have men who are willing to stand their ground and not waiver in their beliefs in this institution, it will never die. This beloved group has, for three hundred years, withstood wars, economic depressions, anti-Masonic movements, and dictators who wished to erase it from the Earth. We stood our ground and we practiced our beliefs.  The only way we will see it cease is if we allow it to, through apathy, through hopelessness, and through quitting. 

I often wonder what would have happened if all of the Brothers who threw their hands up in frustration, picked up their apron and went home had instead stayed and, with other like-minded brethren, banded together and worked as a group to make Freemasonry what they wanted it to be?  I have a feeling that many of the issues these men were having with the craft would have gone away! 

We all have to work together Brethren. Instead of giving up, try finding Brothers who feel the same way you do and make a difference! With all of us working together, we will soon see Freemasonry awake from its slumber and rise to become vibrant again. None of us can do this alone. Come and help us show that the reports of Freemasonry’s death are greatly exaggerated! 

~BH

WB Bill Hosler was made a Master Mason in 2002 in Three Rivers Lodge #733 in Indiana. He served as Worshipful Master in 2007 and became a member of the internet committee for Indiana's Grand Lodge. Bill is currently a member of Roff Lodge No. 169 in Roff Oklahoma and Lebanon Lodge No. 837 in Frisco,Texas. Bill is also a member of the Valley of Fort Wayne Ancient Accepted Scottish Rite in Indiana. A typical active Freemason, Bill also served as the High Priest of Fort Wayne's Chapter of the York Rite No. 19 and was commander of of the Fort Wayne Commandery No. 4 of the Knight Templar. During all this he also served as the webmaster and magazine editor for the Mizpah Shrine in Fort Wayne Indiana.