^This
I don't get it. I'm all for the charitable stuff, and leading a better life. Not sure why you need to believe in a Supreme Being to be allowed through the doors though.

Perhaps TGA can enlighten us? Why is religious belief/spirituality considered to be necessary at all, let alone of paramount importance?
( chart cat has an itch, Mon 31 Aug 2009, 6:34, 2 replies)

The missus works with an atheist mason who lied about his beliefs to get in
I won't mention any more details in case he's found thrown off a bridge at low tide with brickslarge stones in his pockets, but I think it's disgusting and analogous to forcing people to hide their sexuality if it doesn't fit in with the club's image.

Then again, isn't racist homophobe Jim Davidson the Grand Poobah these days? Yeah, that's a club I'd really want to lie about my beliefs to join. It sounds like the institutional version of getting stuck in the pub while some old bastard tells you all about how things haven't been the same around here since they let so many blacks in.
( emvee cruor deo cruoris, Mon 31 Aug 2009, 10:17, closed)

My cooking club requires that all members be interested in cooking.
Is that wrong of us?

If you don't believe in cooking, then you don't have to lie - you just go and join a different, non-cooking related club.
(Seance Trumpet has got no beef with a man enjoying a croissant, Tue 1 Sep 2009, 21:33, closed)

The main - as I understand it - reason for a requirement to believe in a 'Supreme Being'
is that the ceremonies - in craft and most side degrees - relay information to the candidate for that degree via roles that were once associated with religious progression and belief. This is done to 'enlighten' the candidate via allegory to lead a 'better life' as you put it. If you don't have a belief - at whatever level - in a 'supreme being', then you wouldn't take the progression through the degrees seriously, or with any real belief that what you are doing is of any use, therefore why would you take any obligation seriously to make yourself a 'better person' via the way we do it in masonry?

Simply speaking, if you don't have a belief - at any level - you really wouldn't get anything out of masonry. As I've said before though, it isn't a religion in itself, and it isn't practised as a religion.
( The Great Architect is still waiting for his account to be deleted on, Mon 31 Aug 2009, 11:15, closed)

"if you don't have a belief - at any level - you really wouldn't get anything out of masonry"
Except of course the missus's colleague who uses it as a useful way to advance his career in construction. I'm sure he doesn't get anything out of masonry at all by pretending to believe in the "Great Architect".

I really don't want to make a big thing of this, but honestly you sound exactly like the kind of apologisist who explains patiently why gays aren't allowed in churches or black people aren't allowed in the BNP. Just because rationalists wouldn't appreciate the funny-hat stuff, doesn't mean that they wouldn't benefit from the largest old boys' network in the world.

For the record, I was asked a while back by a friend from school. I declined. I've no interest in pretending to believe in a supreme being even for personal or financial gain.
( emvee cruor deo cruoris, Mon 31 Aug 2009, 12:55, closed)

as people have said up above, and I will back up, you don't enter into masonry for financial or other material gain, or at least, you shouldn't as that's not what it's about, or indeed encouraged.
and I'm not apologising for masonry in the slightest, it's just the way it is, you can't please all of the people all of the time. I enjoy it, and it's my own choice, I was just trying to explain an answer to a question, and it's not really fair to start lumping me as an apologist akin to the Black/BNP or Gays/Church arguments as they are Political and Religious respectively in stance, and based around completely different issues. But hey ho, each to their own opinion, and all that. You sound as if your mind is pretty made up about it all, and fair play to you. :)

The entire reason for bringing it up in this QOTW is due to the rather unfair (and uninformed) treatment it gets from the conspiracy theory 'nutters' as the title suggests.
( The Great Architect is still waiting for his account to be deleted on, Mon 31 Aug 2009, 14:29, closed)

I realise it's an unfair comparison and I don't want to have a go at you over it
It's just that to my mind, the stuff at the top of this post (while dispelling myths about the masons and properly so) doesn't really get to the nub of the issue. I couldn't care less if masons *do* sacrifice goats (or whatever the Conspiracists think they get up to...I've known enough witches, pagans and devil worshippers in my time to know that ceremony is just that) - it just concerns me that such a powerful and infuential institution excludes people on the basis of their (lack of) beliefs. As an atheist, I can't help thinking (cynically) it's just a Christian old boys' network with a couple of token Muslims and that masonry desperately needs to get past that if, to be honest, I'm not going to treat it with a largish amount of suspicion. About 50% of this country's population doesn't believe and that figure is going to be far higher in the scientific community, which is where I would hope a lot of the expertise that masonry celebrates is going to be coming from. I dunno, it just seems archaic and stultifying to only draw members from the rapidly-shrinking religious community when there's a wealth of untapped talent out there that really doesn't have any interest in worshipping bronze-age sky gods.

On the subject of charity, the two largest charitable donations in history were both from atheists, and they continue to pump incredible amounts of money into trying to solve the world's problems, such as eradicating malaria. It's not like atheists aren't capable of becoming better people or doing good works, and I really find it annoying when people think religous = good, more so when it's institutionalised.

Anyway, I'm probably just ranting. I've known masons all my life - I've been to a couple of events up at the lodge, hell, one even gave me a lift in his car this morning - but the religious aspect means I'm never going to be a part of it because I'm too proud to pretend, and it saddens me when I see other people affecting a religion they don't believe just to fit in.
( emvee cruor deo cruoris, Tue 1 Sep 2009, 11:30, closed)

It's no different to a nightclub having a 'no trainers' rule.
The Freemasons is a social club. It's not like people are being excluded from schools or being thrown off trains for being atheists - no one actually has to join the Freemasons, just like people in trainers don't have to go to nightclubs.
(Seance Trumpet has got no beef with a man enjoying a croissant, Tue 1 Sep 2009, 21:37, closed)

Well if that's the case
then I don't think Freemasonry and I will ever be bedfellows.

It comes across like the broken reasoning used by some religious believers to defend morality in religious terms, i.e. one must have a religious belief before morality is possible in order to define good and evil; those pesky atheists, with no fear of eternal punishment or reward have no particular reason to do good (or evil too, we atheists equally argue). I won't get into that here though...

As an open-minded atheist, I'm at least as capable as a faith believer of translating and absorbing allegory/roleplay into my own well-considered definition of morality. I consider the aspects of all religions which encourage virtuous behaviour to be good and proper; even Scientology has its plus points in that respect. However, no religion is necessary in order for an individual to lead a good life based on the simple principle of 'treat others as you wish to be treated yourself'.

For the Freemasons to declare it unimportant which god you worship, but to also insist that you must have one is confusing and somewhat insulting to me, as a person who considers myself generally decent despite my godlessness. For example, I wonder what their position would be if I was to choose Mars as my deity, or Satan, or one of the Voodoo gods? I presume certain religions are unacceptable if they encourage behaviour which conflicts with Freemasonry itself.

Anyway, thanks for answering my question :)
( chart cat has an itch, Mon 31 Aug 2009, 13:21, closed)

no problem fella, as I've said before, it's not for everyone
and let's be clear, I haven't knocked atheists in the slightest, and nor would I want to - and neither does masonry. It's not for everyone, but then again, nothing really is. :)
There's plenty of religious groups who knock masonry as there are atheists doing the same.
( The Great Architect is still waiting for his account to be deleted on, Mon 31 Aug 2009, 14:20, closed)

Belief and religion are not the same thing
Don't get belief mixed up with religion. One can believe without being ruled by a religious order. I hold my own personal belief system, not one imposed on me by someone, supposedly appointed by a deity. A religion requires that you have faith in what they tell you, or what they have written, Freemasonry requires that you question, study and learn, most particularly about the sciences, about arts and about yourself. It's one of the reasons religious orders have always had a problem with the craft, some of them prefer blind faith to free thought, it's better for purposes of control.

Oh, and as for your choice of deity as a supreme being, if you truly believed, for instance, in Satan as the top dog, fine, if you can square the morality of wanting to be in a society intended to help mankind, with your personal beliefs and not feel a hypocrite, you'd be welcome in our lodge. We'll never question someone's beliefs, only whether they are behaving as a good mason.
(lardyboy Next stop, Fissplap Central, Wed 2 Sep 2009, 10:53, closed)

Doesn't fly with me
Belief, religion. Call it what you want, the semantics are unimportant. The UGLE site states unambiguously that you must believe in a Supreme Being to be accepted. That's a God, not just a "personal belief system", although once again, labels are not the issue. I'm with emvee on this one, it just seems like an organisation with noble goals which is shackled by outdated rules and elitist mysticism.
( chart cat has an itch, Wed 2 Sep 2009, 15:54, closed)

Still can't see what the problem is
Apart from the fact that there is a massive difference between an organised religion and someone's own personal beliefs, I still can't see what the problem is. Are you this annoyed at the Pope for not letting you be a priest? You're excluded from a whole career structure there, for not believing in the holy trinity. That's shocking that is. Why would you be agrieved at not being able to do something that I'd hazard a guess that you woudn't really want to do anyway?
(lardyboy Next stop, Fissplap Central, Wed 2 Sep 2009, 16:30, closed)