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aedifico42| …and ANOTHER thing…

Posted at: 10:39 pm

So I got my back up (see the previous post “Get Lost…”Brother”" below) about that guy that called me. There’s more.

Freemasonry is about making good men better…right? I don’t think so.

Let’s take a look at that phrase and see why it is exactly the wrong ‘motto’ (or, better stated, “Marketing Pitch”) for Freemasonry. (At this point, I should apologize to the Grand Master of Arizona, since “Making Good Men Better” is his theme for the year…but I won’t. MW Brother Dave respects diverse opinions and will be happy to hear that we are discussing ideas and expanding our minds.)

If the Craft was actually ‘making’ something, then that thing would be the object of the Craft’s energy. The thing is the recipient of the planning and energy of the Craft. In this rhetorical case, the thing is a passive recipient, not responsible for doing any act except receiving whatever was being done to it to “make it better”.

So when we say we are “Making Good Men Better”, we have removed all the responsibility from that supposedly “Good Man”. With this phrase steadily a part of the Masonic lexicon, we have invited the “Good Man” to come to us and sit on his kiester and do nothing. What a crock.

This, obviously, is an exercise in Rhetoric. You remember that one…right? It’s one of the Seven Liberal Arts and Sciences that we are supposed to be learning about. It is part of being a Mason to use Rhetoric (or the lessons of that discipline) to help us improve.

So, rhetorically speaking, we are inviting people into the Craft with no expectation that they will have to work towards anything. Just sit there pal…we’ll make you better. I promise. It has to be true because my pin says so.

Balderdash.

We should be saying things like “Giving Men the Tools to Better Themselves” or “Shining a Light Towards Betterment” or “Get Your Bettermentification Here!”

Anything. Anything besides “Show-up and become magically transformed into somebody who is respected like Geo. Washington.”

…this is another thing about that phone call I referred to above. Too many idiots come into our Lodges (I don’t consider them Masons…even if they do have a “Place Holder” in their wallet) and just expect to be spoon-fed.

My hope is that we continue to shove the importance of exploring the deeper meanings of our ritual down their throats. I hope we get them reading, thinking, talking, sharing and learning. I hope that each of us will continue to stress the importance of those Seven Liberal Arts…ALL of them, to our “Brothers”.

We are engaged in a battle for the future. The battle pitts those of us who care with those of them who don’t know enough to care. We are the Warrior Knights of old who understand that coffee and old stories have value…but they only occupy a slight sliver of the whole. We have obligated ourselves to the betterment of mankind…and we must begin with ourselves and those closest to us.

“Making Good Men Better” is not Freemasonry. Freemasonry is about making it more fun and interesting for you to better yourself. It is about presenting a Man with tools…and instructing him on how to use them. But I would caution the bleeding-hearts out there. You can teach a man to fish, but if he is not hungry…he won’t pick up the fishing pole.

We don’t make good men better. We let men do that to themselves…if they choose to.

Choose Freemasonry…choose being a better Man.

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