Scottish Rite

I have filed my petition with the Ancient Accepted Scottish Rite, Valley of Dayton, Ohio. The Fall reunion is on two weekends this year. I will be a part of the Fall Reunion Class # 259 Ill. John William McNaughton, 33°, Class November 7 & 14, 2009. this reunion will include a visit from
John William McNaughton, Sovereign Grand Commander on November 14, 2009.
McNaughton had been serving as Grand Lieutenant Commander since August. More on him in the Scottish Rite News valley of Dayton.
I was approached concerning my previous interest in the York Rite. However, I chose to become a Scottish Rite mason to join the ranks of my good friends Ken and Dick who have each been a great help to me in my search for Masonic Light as well as my cousin John Carpenter who has allowed his own light to shine on me since I was a child. I am excited to be exposed to the lessons that are to be learned from the Dramas.

I recently saw this...

Proverbs 8:27
When he prepared the heavens, I was there, when he set a compass upon the face of the depth.

A visit to my local bretheren and we come back to light.

I have recently began PhD studies at Ohio university. I am commuting back and forth from Dayton To athens once a week with the family back in Dayton still selling the house. I stopped in to the local lodge for their first stated meeting since going dark. It was a great time. Although it was their stated, the brtheren were out in a good company and very welcoming. The Master invited me to partake in all the lodge has to offer and even participate int he lodge ritual work if I felt so inclined. (He is doing all the lectures and alot of the charges right now as they are looking for others to help.) I was welcomed by EACH and I do mean EACH of the bretheren there that night with the exceptions of three new guys who came in on the one-day class and were a bit nervous I think, to even be there.
The lodge was closed and we went to refreshment which was a very welcome late dinner for this starving student.

Thank you bretheren, I will be there for the EA on the 22nd!

I am also excited to attend my Mother lodge's first meeting this fall tomorrow evening. We will also be having a MM degree on the 25th. I have a full masonic calendar to look forward to this month!

Nervous? Who me?

I was at the airport the other evening welcoming a friend home from a mission she had served for our church. She had been gone for 18 months! I have been friends with her father since I was 13 and he was 23. We are very close. He is very much the father figure to me. I was talking with him when his father came up and asked what was about my neck. He said it in a way that was a bit questioning. I felt myself becoming a little uncomfortable. Nervous even. I replied that it was a symbol of my fraternity, that I was a Freemason. Surely he recognized it, where had he been for the last 74 years of his life? He then replied that he was a Brother and had been so for the last 49 years. Raised in 1960 and PM in 1965. He showed me his watch, a gift from his beloved wife. In all the years I have known his son, he had never mentioned his father being a member of the Mystic Tie.
My thought is; why was I nervous? Was it simply his questioning tone? He is very much the jokester. And also, have any of you brethren experienced this before?
Perhaps it is just the influence of my catholic father, or something else?
Thoughts? How do you represent in the face of adversity?

Done and DONE!

Gave back my work tonight and was found to be proficient. Very glad to have completed this process. It was a quick meeting. Lodge opened, I gave back my work, our secretary and our treasurer were both absent this evening. We dispensed of regular business, someone moved that we allow them to pay the bills for the summer then we went dark until the 18th of September. Lodge opened and closed within 25 minutes. There was then a lecture for our lodge education component downstairs. It seemed to be a bit of a Geri-fest and Ken had a babysitter at home with a kid at a ballet rehearsal so we split. Good stuff.

Tonight is the night

Tonight I am going to the lodge to recieve the Third Degree and be raised to the Sublime Degree of Master Mason. I am not as excited as I thought I would be. That is not to say that I am not looking forward to it. Don't get me wrong. I thought I would not have been able to sleep last night but, I did. Very well I might add. It is kind of one of those things that a few months ago seemed like it would take forever to get here. Now that it is here, i am not sure where the time went. I guess I am pumped, just not the way I thought I would be. It is a sort of "a more dignified pumped".
I surely will be thinking of my cousin John this evening. He is not able to be there but he will be there in spirit, his grandson is graduating form West Point. He was my first exposure to the Craft. I will be giving my work back two weeks from tonight. This is the night we go dark for the summer. The pressure is begining to come on. I am sure I will do well but it will require a good deal of cramming.

Finally found it

I have been looking for a piece of Masonic jewelry since January when I was an Entered Apprentice. I wanted something unique, something out of the ordinary, I wanted something subtle. I have a right hand ring I wear now and do not want to stop wearing it. It is a symbol of who I am and i plan on involving it with my sons when they are older. All of these criteria turned me to a pendant of some kind or another. Since I do not like gold but prefer silver, it was even more narrow. I had quite a search ahead of me.
It was while I was thus engaged, that I came across what I really wanted. I had pretty much decided upon a folding Square and Compass pendant, I just needed to find the best quality and deal. Then I saw it. The one I had to have. Very simple, not flashy, discreet, and it was made the year my great grandfather, (someone who was not a mason but all of his brothers were) was born. He did and still does mean a great deal to me. It was perfect.
I am waiting for it to arrive from the seller in Longfield, Kent, United Kingdom. I am very excited. I look forward to wearing it after I am raised later this month. I think about the brother(s) who once held it before me which leads me to think of those that will hold it after I do.

In the meantime...

I am patiently waiting for the 22nd of May. I will be the first of two that evening to receive the third degree of Freemasonry. I have been the second for both of the preceding degrees and I was sure to give back my work first so as to ensure that I will be able to view the degree work for once before giving my memory work back two weeks later. Doing so has helped me in the past but I have had to come to lodge on a night that the degree was being administered. This meant for the Fellowcraft, I had to travel to another lodge. Not that this was unwelcome, I truly appreciated the opportunity to fellowship with other brethren. However, being able to see what I just went through that night will be very beneficial to me as that is my learning style.


So in the meantime, I have a few activities planned. I just picked up “The man who would be king” from the local library. That will surely satisfy my Masonic appetite for a few days at least. Secondly, I am headed up to the Ohio Masonic Home on the 8th of May for dinner and to see the past masters of the area put on a Fellowcraft for the resident brethren there. I have also been working on laying out the new webpage for our lodge as soon as I hear back from the webmaster for the state, I should be able to access the server to up load it. Our current page is well, not so current. All of this is designed to help me not go crazy by just looking at Masonic jewelry all the time as I wait for the 22nd of May.

Catchup

I have spent far more time in the last few days making this Blog look better than I have in the last two months writing for it. Since My last entry I have not only been made an Entered apprentice, but I have also given back my memory work or "proven up on it" as my cousin in Oklahoma says. I have also been passed to the degree of Fellowcraft in the fraternity and since given back my work for that degree. I am set to have the third degree conferred upon me on the 22nd of May.
I am excited to continue in the work but am even more motivated by the bond that I have felt with the good men of my lodge. I have formed friendships and associations that are enjoyable and stimulating. I have visited another lodge during this process and have discovered old friends that are members of this brotherhood. One, I went to high school with and even saw at the store two weeks before visiting his lodge for the inspection and then while I was there, I ran into two gentlemen my mother was acquainted with in my youth. It was all fascinating to me and resonated of the bond of brotherhood. I have built and strengthened a friendship with My friend Ken who signed my petition and has been working with me to learn the work. And foremost, I have reestablished a relationship with a cousin who is many years my senior and all the way in Oklahoma. He has honored me and my family with the Bible upon which he received his degrees and has strengthened me with his encouragement which is what he has always done.
I am so glad to be a part of this fraternity. I read all kinds of blogs and consume as many opinions and as much information on the subject as i am capable of doing. I look forward to the possibilities of meeting more and more of my brothers as I travel about from lodge to lodge and from page to page.

Entered apprentice

I am writing this just before i go home. Tonight I am going to the lodge to be a candidate for the entered apprentice degree of freemasonry. I cannot tell you how excited I am. I am eager in anticipation to not only go through this degree and get all of this started, but to also be involved with some great men working hard to do even greater things. I am looking forward to being supported by them as I do my best and I look forward to helping them in anyway I can. I spoke with my 2nd cousin last night on the phone. He has been and continues to be one of the greatest of encouragements to me. I called him to let him know that the time had come and I would be going to the lodge the next night. He as he always does, encouraged me by telling me that i would benefit from it and that I would make a fine addition to the fraternity. He has always had kind words when others did not. I told him how much I appreciate him. This fraternity has caused me to already be a better man by sharing my feelings with a man I respect not because he is a mason but because he acts like one. And always has.