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Dabbling in Freemasonry at Downside

UPDATE: I have received word that this issue has been suitably dealt with.

One of Britain’s most prominent Catholic schools, Downside Abbey in Somerset, has a friendship with Freemasonry that Catholics might find rather troubling. As recently brought to light in a report on the Curated Secrets blog, Downside invited “Spenny” Compton, 7th Marquess of Northampton (as well as Britain’s wealthiest Buddhist and sometime Pro-Grand Master of the United Grand Lodge of England) to talk about Freemasonry to students at the Benedictine boarding school. “I was invited two years ago to address some of the senior boys and monks at Downside, the Roman Catholic boarding school,” the Marquess wrote in 2005.

I spoke for nearly an hour on Freemasonry, its symbols and its principles. I quoted passages from the charge after initiation to give an idea of what a candidate is taught in the rituals. I explained the working tools and how we moralise their uses in building our temple, not made with human hands.

I stressed that freemasonry was just a system without dogma and doctrine which leads us through its three ceremonies on a progressive path from ignorance to enlightenment. I pointed out the benefits of the psychological changes that happen to a man as he passes from being an entered apprentice through the various offices to the Master’s chair – how he develops his intellect, leadership qualities, self confidence, tolerance, kindness, compassion, service to others, open heartedness, social responsibility, temperance and above all self awareness.

By the time I had finished and taken questions I left them in no doubt that Freemasonry is a force for good in the world. Even the headmaster remarked how different my version of the Craft was from what he had been led to believe it was like.

Despite the talk of tolerance, Freemasonry has a long-standing tradition of active hostility to the Catholic Church. In the American state of Oregon, to cite just one example, the legislature passed a law forbidding school-age children from attending any schools other than the state-funded public schools following a public campaign by the Grand Lodge of Oregon. The case was successfully challenged and the Supreme Court ruled that states did not have the authority to ban Catholic parents from educating their children in Catholic schools.

In deference to local culture, Freemasonry in English-speaking countries tends to require its members to some belief in God or a god. These theistic lodges nonetheless continue in active fellowship with the more Continental tradition of Freemasonry in which atheism is usually a prerequisite of membership.

Though hostile to the Church as an institution, the Masonic lodges are happy to accept Catholics as members and even actively recruit those Catholics who are ignorant of the Church’s teaching and rules on Freemasonry. In the aftermath of the Second Vatican Council, some Freemasons began to claim that the Catholic Church no longer bans its faithful from joining Masonic lodges.

This confusion led to a definitive restatement by the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith in the 1981 document Clarification concerning status of Catholics becoming Freemasons and the 1983 declaration Quaesitum est which state explicitly that Catholics who become Freemasons are in a state of grave sin and are not allowed to receive the Blessed Sacrament. Both were issued by the then-Cardinal Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict XVI. More recently, in March 2007, Archbishop Gianfranco Girotti, the regent of the Apostolic Penitentiary, reiterated that Catholic membership of Masonic lodges & organisations is forbidden.

Of course, Catholic disapproval of Freemasonry doesn’t mean we frown on Freemasons as individuals. Some of my best friends & drinking companions are Freemasons and I even shared a flat with two Freemasons while at university, during which time I was invited to join the lodge (not by my flatmates, incidentally, who knew better).

Still, one wonders if the Chapter of Downside Abbey or the governors of Downside School are aware of the continued teaching of the Church on the subject of Freemasonry. If they are not aware, then why aren’t they? If they are aware, they why did they invite one of the leading Freemasons of the land to propagandise amongst their impressionable students? Why, furthermore, did they allow a demonstration of the 4th & 5th degrees of the “Ancient & Accepted” Masonic rite to take place at the Abbey on May 28, 2005?

These actions took place almost five years ago now, and one can only hope that conditions at Downside have improved since then. I was certainly impressed by the state of the school during my numerous trips to the Abbey, which is one of my favourite places in all of England. The school authorities should be encouraging vocations to the Benedictines, not to the Freemasons.

Elsewhere: EWTN hosts a series of articles on the subject of Freemasonry & Catholicism.
• Catholicism vs. Freemasonry: Irreconcilable Forever by Fr. Robert I. Bradley, S.J.
• Catholics & the Freemason ‘Religion’ by Fr. William Saunders
• Humanus Genus (Encyclical on Freemasonry) by Pope Leo XIII
Published at 5:10 pm on Wednesday 21 April 2010. Categories: Church Featex Great Britain Tags: , .
Comments

“the legislature passed a law forbidding school-age children from attending any schools other than the state-funded public schools following a public campaign by the Grand Lodge of Oregon”

Normally this law is blamed on the Klan. Perhaps Catholics focus too much on the dead white sheets while the lodges continue their work?

The Klan revival in the late 1910s and early 1920s recruited at Masonic centers, so there was surely some overlap in membership and leadership.

For some reason criticism of Masonry in the U.S. is only the domain of kooks.

— Kevin J Jones 21 Apr 2010 11:35 pm

I have had problems with the Masons recruiting my parishioners. I called the Grand Lodge and asked them politely to stop as it meant that those Catholics could not receive the sacraments. While they have toned it down I do not believe they have stopped completely. Some of my parishioners were distressed at my stance, but I reminded them that it is not MY stance but that of the Church.

— Fr. J 22 Apr 2010 2:18 pm

Well done, Fr. J.

Perhaps someone should write a nice (and I do mean nice, i.e., civil) letter of concern to Downside, requesting clarification of this issue and the event itself, to the Headmaster and the Abbot, copying in the Superior of the English Benedictines.

These boys are prime targets for the “grander” Masons and should be left in no doubt about the Church’s teaching.

If parents of Downside boys were concerned enough to ask questions, I’m sure the school could not, um, afford to ignore them.

Bª

— Benedict Ambrose 23 Apr 2010 7:13 am

Gentlemen,

The ambiguous signals that came from the Holy See in the 1970s did not exactly help. In 1974, Cardinal Seper, prefect of the S. Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, asserted the following, which gave the impression of a “green light” for Catholic entry into Anglo-American Freemasonry until the early 80s and then-Cardinal Ratzinger’s definitive statement.

“The Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith … has ruled that Canon 2335 no longer automatically bars a Catholic from membership of masonic groups … And so, a Catholic who joins the freemasons is excommunicated only if the policies and actions of the freemasons in his area are known to be hostile to the Church …”.

Curated Secrets – http://www.curatedsecrets.com

— Curated Secrets 23 Apr 2010 10:05 am

As a Freemason of 21 years standing I am surprised that the events described have taken almost 5 years to be reported.
I would be very sceptical about there being any masonic ceremony worked in the presence of a person who is not a Freemason.

In Freemasonry there are many orders and these orders require certain criteria to be met.

In the Lodge and Royal Arch degrees you must profess a belief in a Deity. In the Anicent and Accepted(Scottish Rite) you must profess the Christian religion. In the USA the criteria is only a belief in a Deity.

When you become a Freemason you are questioned about your motives for membership.In essence you have taken the step to join this organisation as a matter of choice. No person is forced to become a Freemason or remain a Freemason.

Gerard

— Gerard J O'Donnell 23 Apr 2010 2:44 pm

This was picked up at the time by Christian Order:
http://www.christianorder.com/editorials/editorials_2002/editorials_nov02.html

— RO'B 25 Apr 2010 7:45 am

“These theistic lodges nonetheless continue in active fellowship with the more Continental tradition of Freemasonry in which atheism is usually a prerequisite of membership.”

In point of fact, many if not most of the theistic Anglo grand lodges of Freemasonry long ago left “regular amity” with the atheist continental Orients, either over religion or jurisdiction.

— Mr. WAC 12 May 2010 5:25 pm

And I wouldn’t say that the masons in America (which account for two of ever three masons worldwide) require belief in a Supreme Being out of deference to culture. Freemasonry is the invention of English theists, and the continental Orients, first modeled after the English Grand Lodge, deliberately removed any Judeo-Christian or theistic reference from their ritual sometime in the 19th c. The masonic Anglosphere reacted in horror and cast the continentals out as heterodox (ahem).

— Mr. WAC 12 May 2010 5:30 pm

It’s so complicated! For Anglo Freemasons, links were broken with the Grand Orient de France in the 1870s when the GOdF removed all mention of God from its constitutions and allowed for complete liberty of conscience. (Id est: not the required atheism that I had presumed).

However, by the 1900s, the Grande Loge de France (older than the Grand Orient), which likewise allowed liberty of conscience (and which now enjoys fraternal relations with both the UGLE in England and the Grand Orient in France) was 23 of the US (i.e. Anglo) grand lodges. During the 20th century, twelve U.S. grand lodges even went so far as to have fraternal relations with the Grand Orient itself.

At least that is the most thorough information I can find, as per the research of Paul M. Bessel, a DC-based 32-degree Freemason).

As to the motivations of the requirement for a belief in a Supreme Being, your explanation and mind seem equally legitimate and arguable propositions.

— Andrew Cusack 12 May 2010 6:16 pm

In Scotland Freemasonry is open to all men over the age of 21 years( exception being 18 when the person is the son of a Freemason). A person who wishes to become a Freemason MUST believe in a Supreme Being. That condition of membership is something that admits of no compromise.

My Mother Lodge 1209( Lodge Solomon Scottish Constitution) was started by the members of the Jewish community in Edinburgh and is open to all people who believe in a Supreme Being.

Freemasons are an organisation that has a legitimate right to exist and have an legitimate right to meet as Freemasons.

If Freemasons are invited to speak at any institution then they have the right to speak on behalf of the society. If some people find that offensive in any way; they have the right to peacefully protest and not attend that meeting.

Freemasonry is a society that you join of your own free will and leave in exactly the same manner.

G J O’Donnell

— Gerard J O'Donnell 13 May 2010 4:56 pm

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