Humanity = One Family

[Tamrin]

By the exercise of Brotherly Love, we are taught to regard the whole human species
as one family — the high, the low, the rich, the poor — who, as created by one
Almighty Parent, and inhabitants of the same planet, are to aid, support, and protect each other.
On this principle, Masonry unites men of every country, sect, and opinion, and conciliates true friendship

The following post, dated 3 February 2009, illustrates this sentiment well:

My Brother,

I agree with your fundamental premises. I actually yearn for the day in which a phenomenon like Free-Masonry is no longer needed in the world. Unfortunately this may be a long time off, I will most likely be worm food by then. I would like to see the day in which men and women deal with each other on the level. Not our of fear of the law but out of the true belief that it is simply the proper thing to do.

Social systems can be viewed as an organic entity that are subject to the same competition for resources that any other organic entity is. If there is a better way for us all to live together, and I think that there is, then we must live it and enter into the competition for the limited free energy in the enclosed system. We must find a way together. Not just in Masonry but in the world. Masonry for the sake of Masonry is pointless and has no meaning. Masonry for the sake of the philosophy is also pointless unless it is put into practice. Masonry itself is just a working tool. It is a means rather than an end. We Brethren around the world, regardless of "jurisdiction", have Great Works to accomplish and foundations to lay for Brothers and Sisters that will come after us. There is nothing stopping us but our own limited ideas. Small groups, and we are not small together, can create great change in the world society. We will have completed building the Temple when the entire lot of humanity can view each other as one family. Until such time we need to continue laboring in the quarries. Though the Craft is important to me, in my time, I hope that the generations that come after us will view it as intellectual curiousity with no real function in their world. That will be a great day indeed. Freemasonry can be a powerful force for positive and directed change, or it can languish in its own internal politics. We have the power as free thinking men and women to work in the world and make changes that will benefit all of humanity.

I apologize for being so dramatic. It is not something that I normally do. This topic brought it out of me. We have a lot of work to do Brothers.

Frat.·.
Brandt

[Tamrin]

What a difference a few years can make:

Brotherhood, to whom? Everyone or to Masons? If to everyone, why Masonry at all?

Rembrandt, 17 October 2012

[Torence]

Usually when people think of the Peace Movement, at least here in the States, thoughts of the 1960’s and Flower Power soon spring to mind; but the first and greatest push for Universal Peace during the twentieth century nearly realized its dream of pleasant co-existence in 1908. As early as 1901, the Czar of Russia called for a Peace Conference and representatives from 26 countries accepted his invitation. Here in Illinois, our Grand Lodge Session then focused on this topic and Right Worshipful Brother Elmer Beach, our Grand Orator, had this to say:

“War as a means of adjustment of international disputes may hopefully be said to be a thing of the past, for two absolutely conclusive reasons, one, economic or physical, the other, moral or humanitarian.”

“As one stands on the mountain top and sees the valleys running down to the plain below, and through the trees the silver streams trickling, and knows they lead on to some mighty river, so we look through the history of the past two or thee hundred years and see how material civilization, political progress, national history, industrial development and religious thought flow together to make one great majestic stream which we call International Brotherhood.”

My how close we came, then, to making Universal Peace into reality. In my humble opinion, the 20th Century saw technology advance; but our failure was that We as Men failed to develop as Creatures along with that technology. Can We not as 21st Century Creatures do better and should not FreeMasonry be First and Foremost with the Cause of Universally Accepted World Wide Peace? I think that FreeMasonry by its nature is uniquely suitable to the purpose; but that we have allowed the War Hawks and Arm Chair Generals among us Shanghai Us from one of our fundamental and most laudable purposes.

Far too many Grand Lodges have it that for their Membership that they must praise the type of Man who chooses for his Career one that comes with a Uniform, a Name Badge and License to Kill. Am I the only Mason who can do no more than pity that type of man?

In 1908, RWB Beach pointed out that “from the year 1496 Before the Beginning of the Christian Era, to the outbreak of the Civil War in American, the world knew only 227 years of peace, and was cursed with 3130 years of war- 13 years of war to one year of peace.

Is it not time to try another formula; and, Can We not, as Masons, mutually agree that this should be our cause?

Torence Evans Ake
Secretary - Auburn Park Lodge No. 789 - Crete, Illinois
Chaplain - Triluminar Lodge No. 767 - Lansing, Illinois
MIGS - Illinois Lodge of Research
PM - Arcadia Lodge No. 1138 - Lansing, Illinois
City and Country Steward
[e-mail]

[Tamrin]

Jan 3, 2013 10:02:17 GMT 10 Torence said:

Usually when people think of the Peace Movement, at least here in the States, thoughts of the 1960’s and Flower Power soon spring to mind; but the first and greatest push for Universal Peace during the twentieth century nearly realized its dream of pleasant co-existence in 1908. As early as 1901, the Czar of Russia called for a Peace Conference and representatives from 26 countries accepted his invitation.

Earlier there was the first Hague Peace Conference in 1899, of which there were great expectations:

I am convinced that when the history of international law comes to be written centuries
hence, it will be divided into two periods: the first being from the earliest times to the
end of the nineteenth century, and the second beginning with the Hague Conference

Ludwig Quidde



Delegates at the 1899 Hague Peace Conference

[Torence]

That is me standing second from the right back row behind the president's chair.

Torence Evans Ake
Secretary - Auburn Park Lodge No. 789 - Crete, Illinois
Chaplain - Triluminar Lodge No. 767 - Lansing, Illinois
MIGS - Illinois Lodge of Research
PM - Arcadia Lodge No. 1138 - Lansing, Illinois
City and Country Steward
[e-mail]

[Tamrin]

Jan 3, 2013 10:02:17 GMT 10 Torence said:

Is it not time to try another formula; and, Can We not, as Masons, mutually agree that this should be our cause?

After dismissing the League of Nations as “… merely a place where politicians meet and strike bargains for their particular countries” (rather than addressing questions impartially), J.S.M. Ward, in Freemasonry: Its Aims and Ideals (1923, p.220), observed (ibid., pp.220/1):

Yet all the time a real league of nations exists, a spiritual union, stronger than religious or national prejudice, a union of hearts — Freemasonry. Cannot this Masonic league of nations be made articulate? I believe it can, and perhaps even in our own lifetime.

Ward then lapses, giving unfortunate expression to his opinion of the superiority of England and English-speaking nations and to his Christian sense of noblesse oblige . He eventually recovers to conclude (pp.231/2):

And with this glimpse of the Vision Splendid I lay aside my pen. Must it remain but a vision and must man and his civilisations again go down through anguish, toil, and war to their inevitable destruction? I will not believe it. Freemasonry has not survived the wreck of mighty empires and the corroding hand of time merely to serve as a pleasant social centre where men can escape from the worries of their home life. Neither has it spread throughout the length and breadth of the whole world for no other purpose than to work a stately ritual and provide an excuse for eating a good dinner.

Nay, it has a loftier mission, and on us falls the responsibility, and to us comes the great glory, of taking one more step which will complete the task and solve the age-old problem of how to save mankind.

Therefore to all true Masons throughout the world I send forth the message:

Let us to our task while it is yet day, for the night cometh when no man can work. Step by step we can reach our goal, and though we ourselves may not live to see the day of attainment, yet if we play our part now we shall thereby make certain the final triumph.

“Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, goodwill toward men.”