catfood@ncoast.org (Mark W. Schumann) (06/11/91)
I was visiting a Methodist family this weekend and something came up about Masons. Cliff said that the United Methodist governing body recently made a statement to the effect that secret societies such as the Masons are incompatible with the idea of a Christian community. Can anyone confirm, deny, or qualify this report? -- ============================================================ Mark W. Schumann 3111 Mapledale Avenue, Cleveland 44109 USA Domain: catfood@ncoast.org UUCP: ...!mailrus!usenet.ins.cwru.edu!ncoast!catfood "I think the expression 'all talk and no action' was invented for me." --Bill Stachowiak ============================================================
pha50@seq1.keele.ac.uk (P.J. Mitchell) (06/12/91)
From article <Jun.10.23.22.36.1991.752@athos.rutgers.edu>, by catfood@ncoast.org (Mark W. Schumann): > I was visiting a Methodist family this weekend and something came > up about Masons. Cliff said that the United Methodist governing > body recently made a statement to the effect that secret societies > such as the Masons are incompatible with the idea of a Christian > community. > > Can anyone confirm, deny, or qualify this report? I believe this to be the official position of Methodism in the UK, I'm fairly sure that the Anglicans are chewing over a motion of the same sort at Synod. -- Paul Mitchell (CMA#86(18) MAG#65715 DoD#0145) | Physics Department, JANET: p.j.mitchell@uk.ac.keele.seq1 | Keele University, Keele, USENET: p.j.mitchell@seq1.keele.ac.uk | Staffordshire, ST5 5BG, U.K. BITNET: p.j.mitchell%seq1.keele.ac.uk@ukacrl | (+44 or 0)782 621111 ext 3966
cliff@buster.stafford.tx.us (Cliff Tomplait) (06/12/91)
catfood@ncoast.org (Mark W. Schumann) writes: >I was visiting a Methodist family this weekend and something came >up about Masons. Cliff said that the United Methodist governing >body recently made a statement to the effect that secret societies >such as the Masons are incompatible with the idea of a Christian >community. >Can anyone confirm, deny, or qualify this report? Mark: I asked a friend and masonic brother. He said that the governing body meets every four (4) years and is due to meed in 1992. To date, no such statement has been made. He also mentioned that bishops can say things, but since quite a few are masons, that he doubts that would be the case. Also, during the Texas Conference, the masons were specifically mentioned (as in the good done by us). This was last year. Cliff [I should have thought of this myself. When you talk about "the United Methodist governing body", you've got to be talking about the Quadrennial Conference, which as you point out hasn't met recently. So it couldn't be that. The bishops, various staff groups, and various Annual Conferences do from time to time make statements on social issues. In theory it could be one of those. On the other hand, most objections to the Masons come from fairly conservative Christians. It's not the sort of thing you'd expect from the United Methodists. I'd suggest that unless somebody has more evidence, we should regard the report as probably erroneous. --clh]
jhaynes@ohstpy.mps.ohio-state.edu (06/15/91)
In article <Jun.10.23.22.36.1991.752@athos.rutgers.edu>, catfood@ncoast.org (Mark W. Schumann) writes: > I was visiting a Methodist family this weekend and something came > up about Masons. Cliff said that the United Methodist governing > body recently made a statement to the effect that secret societies > such as the Masons are incompatible with the idea of a Christian > community. > > Can anyone confirm, deny, or qualify this report? I have a book call THE DEVIL'S ALPHABET by Koch an author from Germany and he says for the letter F free masonary is one of the devil's schemes to deceive us from the truth. An example of this he share a certain lodge master took some of the secert books of the lodge to his house for save keeping. The lodge master died and the books fell into the hands of his daughter who was told never to look into the books. She revealed to Koch that the book had instructions to kill anyone who left the lodge and how to do it. Read the book for yourself and see what it says. He does mension that his life was treaten that if he used the material in his book he would be kill. Well he is still alive today and so is the girl who shared it with them. An example in my life that my grandfather died who was a mason before the funeral only two days after his death, some men from his lodge came to visit my grandmother and remove several of the books from his library. I know a little bit of the context of some of the books of masons but was turned off because anything that is so secert that the men came to get them from a dead man I don't want any part of it. It could be quite innocent as men playing the club house games as we did when we are kids or as damning someone to hell for putting another god before the Almight God "Jesus". For me I'll stick with the Almighty God and not play in the secert powers of this dark world. I hope this helps, Joel [The Masonic tradition is a very broad one, and covers groups with rather different orientations. It's probably not a good idea to use information from Germany to characterize Masonic practice in the U.S., since much continental Masonry had an atheist character, while this does not generally seem to be the case in the U.S. There are some really bizarre groups with Masonic roots, such as the infamous P9 lodge. However I know enough Christian Masons to be fairly confident that the organization most people in the U.S. are thinking of is not following secret powers of the dark world. Some Christians will still object, for various reasons that have been mentioned here in the past. --clh]
tblake@bingsuns.cc.binghamton.edu (Tom Blake) (06/15/91)
In article <Jun.11.22.45.35.1991.24001@athos.rutgers.edu>, cliff@buster.stafford.tx.us (Cliff Tomplait) writes: |>catfood@ncoast.org (Mark W. Schumann) writes: |>>I was visiting a Methodist family this weekend and something came |>>up about Masons. Cliff said that the United Methodist governing |>>body recently made a statement to the effect that secret societies |>>such as the Masons are incompatible with the idea of a Christian |>>community. |>>Can anyone confirm, deny, or qualify this report? |>[I should have thought of this myself. When you talk about "the |>United Methodist governing body", you've got to be talking about the |>Quadrennial Conference, which as you point out hasn't met recently. |>So it couldn't be that. The bishops, various staff groups, and |>various Annual Conferences do from time to time make statements on |>social issues. In theory it could be one of those. On the other |>hand, most objections to the Masons come from fairly conservative |>Christians. It's not the sort of thing you'd expect from the United |>Methodists. I'd suggest that unless somebody has more evidence, we |>should regard the report as probably erroneous. --clh] Hi folks, your resident United Methodist here. I've been out of town for most of the week, (at our Annual Conference), I haven't heard of such a report. I can tell you that a number of my relatives are both United Methodists and Masons. "General Conference" meets every four years as OFM (AKA clh) suggests and it will next meet in 1992 (part of our business at Annual Conference this year was the election of delegates to go to General Conference). "General Conference" is the sole body that can set "The Discipline" of the UMC. (Our "Discipline" is the book of rules governing procedures in the church, I.E. who can be ordained, what is the responsibility of the trustees of the local church etc.) The Discipline might be an appropriate place to insert a statment saying for instance that the local shriners shouldn't be allowed to meet in the church building. Just about anybody can petition General Conference to change "The Discipline". At "Annual Conference" we considered a number of these petitions, most we rejected, some we approved of. These petitions however can all be sent straight to "General Conference". So, a number of bodies might have issued such a statement. My best guess would be a sub-committee, or commission, or board of the General Council On Ministries. (Maybe "Church and Society", this division of GCOM tends to be a focus of social reform.) I'll try to find out if this thing is for real or not. Tom Blake SUNY-Binghamton [Tom is tactfully not pointing out explicitly that I used the term Quadrennial Conference when I should have said General Conference. --clh]
tblake@bingvaxu.cc.binghamton.edu (Thomas Blake) (06/21/91)
>In article <Jun.10.23.22.36.1991.752@athos.rutgers.edu>, catfood@ncoast.org (Mark W. Schumann) writes: >> I was visiting a Methodist family this weekend and something came >> up about Masons. Cliff said that the United Methodist governing >> body recently made a statement to the effect that secret societies >> such as the Masons are incompatible with the idea of a Christian >> community. >> >> Can anyone confirm, deny, or qualify this report? Okay, I called the conference office this morning, (Roughly analogous to a Diocese in the RCC), they know of no such statement. They made mention that some denominations do not permit their clergy to be members of masonic orders. There is no such limitation in the UMC at this time. Tom Blake SUNY-Binghamton