Freemason Scots 'laid foundations of America'

Times Online (UK) ^ | July 4, 2005 | Kath Gourlay

[MeanWestTexan]

"He was a nominal member, at best, and never an active one. "

LOL.

He was a "Worshipful (Honorable) Master" (i.e., president) of a lodge, donated his home to the Masons (who take care of it), took his oath of office on a masonic bible, laid the cornerstone of the capital wearing his apron, and had a masonic funeral.

[MeanWestTexan]

Here:

http://www.gwmemorial.org/Chronology.htm

[MeanWestTexan]

"Does the fact that my grandfather is a high level Mason from the Dominican Republic help?"

To some degree, I suppose. He can be one of your three masons who vouch for you.

It's actually very egalitarian, as one would expect from a group that got together and dumped tea into the harbor.

[MeanWestTexan]

I did not know that.

[nuffsenuff]

Are you a Mason?

[MeanWestTexan]

I am so taken and accepted.

[olde north church]

1. If you are a Roman Catholic, you will be excommunicated if you become a Mason. You can, however, become a member of Opus Dei.
2. Several of the founders were Rosicrusions.
3. The third political party to form in America, after the Federalists and anti-Federalists, was the Anti-Masonic Party in 1828. It was initiated by Evangelical Christians in southern New York state. They held a nominating convention in Pennsylvania.

[nuffsenuff]

Just checking.

[GVnana]

My dad was a Mason in a lodge located in Shanghai, China, in the 1930s

That's amazing! But I guess it shouldn't be. It's all over the world.

One of the reasons my son got off his duff and decided to join is so many of his COs wear masonic rings!

[CaptRon]

There is a house on the New York/New Jersey border called the DeWindt House where Washington stayed just before the evacuation of New York in 1783 and several other times during the war. It is maintained by the Masons. (John Andre was hanged just around the corner for plotting with Arnold).

[nuffsenuff]

1. If you are a Roman Catholic, you will be excommunicated if you become a Mason. You can, however, become a member of Opus Dei.

Ummm.... I need confirmation of this. This would be a problem for me.

[GVnana]

Very interesting. I look forward to visiting someday.

[RKV]

"He was a nominal member, at best, and never an active one. (The freemasons like to proclaim otherwise, but it's not historically supported.)" Not true. He just happened to be wearing his masonic regalia when the cornerstone of the Capitol Building was laid.

[CondorFlight]

Washington's reputation as a mason, like the reports of Mark Twain's death, been a bit exaggerated. . .

(from the NET)--

"George Washington was a Mason, but was such an indifferent one that he can be called a Mason only technically. On September 25, 1798, just a little over a year before Washington died, he wrote to a preacher by the name of Snyder to correct an error Snyder had run concerning Washington's presiding over the English lodges in this country. In this letter Washington said in part: "The fact is, I presided over none, nor have I been in one more than once or twice within the last thirty' year.”

"Washington never really held any office in a Masonic lodge. He was called Master of the lodge at Alexandria, Va., for the space of a year, but it is admitted by Masonic authority that he did not preside a single time during that period.

"The records of King David's Lodge, Newport, R. I., show that as early as 1771 it was not agreeable to Washington to be called a Mason even in private. In response to a communication from the Legislature of Pennsylvania, Governor Ritner, among other facts, established that all the alleged letters from Washington to lodges were spurious. In speaking of Masonry, Washington said it was "for the most part child's play," and that it "might be used for the worst purposes."

[moog]

Masons were prominent in early US and Canadian governments.

Now it's Skull and Bones:).

[CondorFlight]

Become a mason if you like, but in the higher degrees, you will have to renounce the idea that Jesus is unique, or divine; and in the 33rd degree initiation, a candle
representing "the mason" Jesus, is snuffed out.

Even conservative protestants (as well as the RCC) accept it's status as a cult or alternative religion. (Salvation Army soldiers are forbidden to join the masons, also.)

[MeanWestTexan]

I don't that is correct, although I have seen that stated.

Masons are very much not a religion, merely a fraternity of religious men. There is NO theology involved, so I see no religious reason for it.

I do know, however, that the prohibitions for Roman Catholics dated to back when the Masons were a trade guild of free masons (basically a union) and also from the Crusades (Knights Templar). As a trade union the masons got in fights about with their big customer -- Churches.

Various popes and others tried to union-bust, in effect, to cut down on the cost of building churches.

Masons also have tended to be very egalitarian and suspicious of authority --- e.g. Paul Revere and the rest --- which makes those in power nervous, so they bucked Rome on occassion.

Politics, in short.

[MeanWestTexan]

"Become a mason if you like, but in the higher degrees, you will have to renounce the idea that Jesus is unique, or divine; and in the 33rd degree initiation, a candle
representing "the mason" Jesus, is snuffed out."

That is a bold-face slander.

[Matchett-PI]

Leftist "logic":

"Many of America's Founders were "freemasons" therefore the Constitution really isn't in place to guard absolute (self-evident) moral truths and we have the right to change it."

[kellynla]

FYI Freemasonry & Catholicism
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/09771a.htm