About the Masons' shrinking size....

A writer's comments on Tierney's NY Times column on the Masons:

Sorry – but Tierney has it mostly wrong. Yes, the Masons are definitely shrinking in numbers, but the predominate reasons are: They are still a racist organization, the rituals take a great deal of time for every meeting and most younger people (people who think dial-up is slow) would rather get to the point, the “old guard” has no intention of changing (this comes back to the “I had to do it this way and so do new members” and the new members don’t want to spend that much time memorizing what they feel are useless, worn out antiquated rituals).

The central organization of the Masonic order may realize that changes need to be made, but control is still held in the hand of local chapters and those chapters have no intention of changing – even as chapters shrink and close around them. My dad has been a Mason and Shriner longer than I’ve been alive and he readily admits to the reasons for the problems and says that “the damn old dinosaurs won’t change – and nothing will happen until they die off and hopefully by then it won’t be too late.” He continues to be involved because of the work he and the Shrine hospitals do for children but as for the rest of it says it’s just too much about old men and their BS (and he’s 80!).

If the Masons want to see their organization continue they need to cease the racism, get rid of a great deal of the memorization and ritual (not all of it, but after a while it becomes silly and pointless – no one is trying to break down their doors and younger men want to get home at a decent hour and put the kids to bed), become even more of a service-oriented organization (like the Lions, Optimists, etc. The hospitals are wonderful, but they need more local community involvement as well), and become more of what’s needed for members today and not just what was needed decades and centuries ago. In other words: stay relevant – like most other things in life because if you’re not relevant you’re irrelevant and that’s where the Masons are finding themselves.

Miles

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