fan boy; secrecy
Music: Duran Duran: The Singles, 1986-1995 (2006) Yesterday had one of those exciting experiences that only my comrades in Geekdom can understand: I had an extended phone conversation with a scholar whose work I have admired for many years. I don't think I've felt quite this excited conversing with a scholar since I met Robert L. Scott and Karlyn Kohrs Campbell for the first time (oh, I take that back; I felt this way when I met Larry Grossberg for the first time as well, who told me not to go to UNC). It's this bizarre feeling, like you're in the presence of Moses or Mother Theresa or something. Talking with him Wednesday I was reminded, too, how those initial fuzzies are often banished by "down to earth" displays of commonness: the scholar turns out to be just another very human being who is obviously a heavy smoker and likes to talk about "chasing ass" like the rest of us.
The person I spoke to yesterday is Rex R. Hutchens, perhaps the United States' foremost authority on Scottish Rite ritual, Masonic symbolism, and the teachings of Albert Pike. Hutchens is the new editor of Heredom, the best scholarly research journal focused on Masonry, and he has decided to print a modified version of an essay I wrote. The original version of the essay is forthcoming in Rhetoric and Public Affairs, however, because it is an argument that is perhaps more relevant to Masons I revamped it and sent it to Heredom. After waiting for months I finally got an email from Hutchens: "I want to print this. Call me."
So after a couple of days of phoning I finally called and caught him. We spoke for over an hour, first on minor revisions and "pittly" things to prepare the manuscript, but then about the state of Masonry in general. It was really fun, because at times Hutchens would point me to passages in Morals and Dogma to illustrate his points and so on (in other words, it was something like bible study; I learned a bunch). What was so endearing about the conversation was finding someone who shared my opinion about what I see happening to the Masons; after I learned that, it was like talking to an old friend. I've shared this opinion with a number of my brethren, and mostly they politely disagree.
So what is it? In the past four years of so, a number of good Masons---folks whom I both admire and respect---have been appearing on television (in History Channel documentaries and so on) and publishing books in an attempt to give recent publicity (mostly owing to The DaVinci Code) a positive spin. What's astonishing to me is that a number of these folks have been saying "there are no secrets in Masonry," which just seems absurd. The essay I wrote for both RP&A and Heredom draws on the work of Habermas and Jodi Dean in order to argue that secrecy is central to a sense of community; I argue that it’s the secrecy of Masonry that makes it coherent and persist as a fraternity. For me, giving up the secrecy of Freemasonry is akin to a death knell.
Many folks do not agree with this opinion. The underlying assumption of those who disagree with me is that Masonry's numbers are on the decline, and so anything we can do to increase our membership is a good thing. This seems to me a bit like the tail wagging the dog. Hutchens and I seem to agree that if our numbers decrease, that's not necessarily a bad thing. Over the past fifty years, the charity-work of the fraternity has eclipsed Masonic philosophy---the study of the fraternity's history and symbolism. This is unfortunate; as Hutchens put it on the phone yesterday, "we're turning into the Elks."
Although republicanism was hatched in Masonic lodges, they were nevertheless exclusive; not everyone deserves to belong. Although I'm a relatively new Mason (going on four years—golly, and I cannot believe its been that long!) I do not think the current publicity campaign does the fraternity any good. I have often heard an older brother at a reunion or ceremony whisper into the ear of a newly made brother not to worry about symbolism, that "it's just a formality," hundred-years old "mumbo-jumbo." That kind of talk is both dangerous and deceptive.