It’s easy to have a solitary life these days. We can order online just about anything from pizza to furniture with no more human contact than the Alexa voice which notifies us that the Amazon delivery truck just left. We can watch movies on our personal big screen TV and eat our personal microwaved popcorn, so there’s no need even to be part of the crowd at a theater. Even our GMU education can be asynchronous – online, recorded and absent of involvement with live people.
All this convenience has advantages, which is why we use it. For instance, as I write this, it’s 23 degrees, with a feels-like temperature of nine degrees, and there’s probably ice under the snow. Better to stay in. And – full disclosure – I’m taking an asynchronous course this semester; I’ll probably be in Europe for two or three weeks, so a fixed schedule would make me miss classes.
Just the same, a solitary life is not Masonic. It is foreign to our tradition – our practices – which date from days when men of our Craft worked side by side. In working together, men shared more than working tools. They shared their personalities and their personal experiences.
So do we in this lodge. The theme I take for the year 2025 is Freemasonry in Our Lives. One way to act as friends and brothers is simply to be there with each other. Ritual practices and attendance at events such as Homecoming bring us into a shared space, the polar opposite of solitude. Another way is, as our ancient brethren did, simply to share our life stories. Some of us will do this in lodge presentations in which they will tell us about their challenges and how they use our common tools to deal with them. We can learn from them and share our stories.
WhatsApp and Facebook have their valuable functions. They can remind us of our connections. But science tells us that internet interactions lack capacity for deep interactions; they are not capable of fully fostering the mystic tie. Freemasonry does. Through it, we help each other toward our common – and individual – goal of lives of honor.
So even though we live in a cyber culture that fragments people into isolated lives, we as Masons have an advantage – our fraternal society, old school, which bonds us. It’s there for us to use. Let’s use it. See you around….
Ira