I'm here in our grand and glorious Temple room at the house of the temple in Washington DC to tell you about the two things that Freemasons are forbidden to discuss [Music] welcome to the Scottish rate of Freemasonry Channel I'm Maynard Edwards 32nd degree kcch Scottish rate Freemason your host here on the channel do us a favor subscribe to the channel right now just hit that subscribe button also share the video with a friend so you can pass a little wisdom along drop a comment below especially if you're a Freemason dmalay job's daughter's rainbow Eastern Star
Grotto Shrine drop it below and of course we do want you to like the video and give us a thumbs up you know there's an old saying and sometimes it's attributed to Mark Twain and sometimes to Charlie Brown and Snoopy and I think it actually goes back even further than Twain and goes back to an 18th century etiquette book but basically the idea is that you should never discuss religion or politics in polite company to say it another way if you don't feel like shopping for Christmas presents then go ahead and bring up religion and
politics at Thanksgiving religion and politics and those conversations are things that separate and divide people because everybody has their own belief and their own opinions and those are two things that Freemasons in Lodge don't discuss but we're going to discuss them right here on the channel today and why Masons don't talk about them we'll start with politics because it's a little easier to get into a little easier to understand politics is something that can divide people there are left and right libertarian Democrat Republican all of those things there was once an anti-masonic party even the
first third party in fact was the anti-masonic Party politics is one of those things that divides people and in a masonic lodge the Brotherhood sort of Demands that we put those differences aside no matter what side of the political aisle or what part of the political Spectrum you may rest upon in Freemasonry we don't discuss it in Lodge now that doesn't mean that Freemasons can never talk about politics obviously there are many great politicians throughout out history and great leaders throughout history who were Freemasons who were open about their political thoughts and ideas that's okay
but the minute you're in the lodge room the minute the door is closed we have a gentleman's agreement to not discuss those things that are going to divide us so we put all of those things aside and we show up there for the purpose of improving ourselves and finding ways to improve our communities now let's talk about religion and Freemasonry one of the main questions I get asked here on the channel and on our podcast feeds and in emails and Facebook and all kinds of other things is who is the god of Freemasonry or who
do masons worship or what's the deal with the grand architect of the universe or Supreme architect of the universe and it's a good question but I want to be very clear about the answer Freemasonry is not a religion I'm going to repeat that Freemasonry is not a religion the fraternity which is what it is [Music] the fraternity does not provide salvation of the Soul or Grant entrance into heaven or provide religious instruction of any kind Freemasonry respects the faith of all men here in our Temple room this is our main altar right behind me here
and on it you will see five books of faith in the center as a plain old ordinary King James Holy Bible now it does have a masonic Square Encompass on it no doubt but if you open it up on the inside it's just a plain old ordinary King James Bible and if you don't believe me you're welcome to come here we're open Monday through Thursday for tours during the day come on in crack it open and you will see it's a plain old ordinary Bible also in the upper right hand corner you will see the
Quran that is the holy book of Muslims down here this is the pentaton the pentatealk is basically the first five books of the Torah so it is the five books of Moses it is a holy book for men who are of the Jewish faith then over here we have the Lotus Sutra which is a holy book for people who are Buddhist and up there we have the Gita which is a holy book for people who are Hindu when a lodge is open in other words when men are in here participating in a meeting there's only
one book on the altar one book of sacred law and that one book is generally reflective of the majority of the men's religion in the room so if the room is full of Christians it's going to be the Holy Bible but if the room is full of Muslims or Hindu it could be the Quran it could be the Gita it could be the pentaton it could be any of these books now like politics religion is something that can really divide people and so we do not have discussions about religion in Lodge that is off the
table as well that doesn't mean that we don't pray in Lodge we pray at the beginning and end of every single Masonic meeting because to be a man of Faith you should invoke the blessing of God in all great things and so when we sit down for our meetings when we sit down for our meals we always say our prayers in a masonic setting however when we say our prayers we use the term grand architect of the universe or Supreme architect of the universe and I saw a pastor on a YouTube video recently talking about
Freemasonry and saying he he was opposed to masonry because of the use of that term and he said that masonry was the religion of deism in other words [Music] and that's not accurate that's not why we use the term the reason we use the term God of All Things grand architect of the universe Supreme architect is so that we do not show favor to One Faith over another each of these five different books of Faith each of these five different religions and indeed every religion you can think of has a different name for deity they
call God by many many different names so by saying our prayers to the generic God of all things or the grand architect of the universe we're able to share time and Lodge together not get into big discussions over who's right about the name of God and still be together and work together as brothers and respect one another's Faith so Freemasonry is not a religion Freemasonry is not a political party Freemasonry is a Brotherhood when we enter that large room we leave the discussions of religion and politics at the lodge room door we go into the
the lodge to learn to improve ourselves to learn to be better husbands fathers friends citizens we go in to learn how to improve our family life our community life to improve the world around us we go in to work on charitable Endeavors and we go to have a lot of fun with other good men of Faith Freemasons tons of them are politicians have been throughout history as you know Freemasons tons of them are clergy men but we're all men of faith we leave those discussions at the lodge room door my brothers I know you're watching
I need you to back me up in the comments below give us that thumbs up and if you haven't please subscribe to the channel but Mason's I do expect you to drop a comment below and help us out as we admire through this discussion about religion and politics and why Freemasons aren't supposed to talk about those things in launch I'm Maynard Edwards 32nd degree kcch Scottish rate Freemason your host here on the channel thanks for watching we'll see you soon [Music] thanks for watching if you would like to learn more about Freemasonry click the link
above to visit be a freemason.org it will answer all your questions about Freemasonry and help connect you with a lodge in your area we would love it if you would subscribe to the channel and give us a thumbs up of course and if you're a Mason not only do we want you to comment below but we want you to help us support the Lost media archive for only two dollars a month you can help us preserve Masonic history in the form of 20th Century Media I'm talking about tapes records films DVDs VHS you name it
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