Masonic Manners: Author Unknown

"Much conduct in lodge is governed by tradition, custom, and usage, with no force of law to enforce or penalty for infringement. Masonic manners, like those of civilized society, are rooted in the dictum that conduct which makes for the comfort and pleasure of others is good.

Manners differ in different countries, States, Grand Lodges. What is customary in one may be strange to another. As no laws govern manners, there is only a consensus behind them; no legal penalty accrues to the man. So it is with Masonic manners; they are a body of habit grown up through the years for the general good of all, "rules" without penalty for breaking, yet observances which make for dignity and comfort in, and respect for, the Ancient Craft.

This article is neither a pronouncement of authority, nor an attempt to be the Emily Post of Freemasonry. It but recounts some of the courtesies and etiquette of lodge life as generally not necessarily universally practiced."

To read the complete acticle, please click main title or here.

Another excellent article on Masonic Etiquette is the Short Talk Bulletin by MW Bro J. Kirk Nicholson, Jr., PGM, Georgia.

Most of the manners referred here are customarily "accepted" in the United States and countries and jurisdictions like the Philippines, whose mother Grand Lodge is of the Southern Jurisdiction (Grand Lodge of California). Most are acceptable and are being practiced also in England and Australia. But obviously, each jurisdiction has a "peculiar" way of doing things.

For example in my mother lodge, no liqour is allowed inside the Lodge, even in the Social Hall! In some Southern States' Jurisdiction, members are not allowed to own liquor licences or even work at licensed premises! Nowadays, smoking is not allowed at all inside most Lodges. Australian laws are much stricter that it does not alllow smoking in confined space.

Australian, and many other jurisdictions also expect everyone to have their own aprons. Even in countries, such as the US and the Philippines, who use to have "community aprons" are expecting their members to own and bring their own.

Again, there are so many practices that are good in comparison to what we have been accustomed to. It makes a Lodge unique in a way.

For example in Australian and English Lodges, the "south" is an integral part of the Lodge meeting. Everybody is seated and served with a meal and drinks; including and especially alcoholic beverages. Guests and visitors are welcomed, toasts and speeches made, and tickets sold, bought and raffled for charity or other purposes. While this fellowship is a bit formal, the excellent speeches and toasts makes it worthwile in my mind.

Informal fellowships has its place as well. But this is for another topic.

"No phrases in closing seem more fitting than the following by R. W. Henry G. Meacham, Grand Lecturer, Grand Lodge of New York:

"There is a certain grave beauty in the practice of Masonic etiquette. The Masonic life as it is lived out in our assemblies is a conscious work of art, with each and every part coordinated to every other, and instinct with the feeling of the whole; if a man enters into that system without preparation or forethought, and trusting only his instincts, his manner will strike an awkward note, like a discord jangling across a strain of music; but if he has trained himself in his part and caught the spirit of the whole, the genius of Freemasonry will shine through: his actions, will express itself through ritual, symbol, law, philosophy, fellowship and daily deed.

To have one's self thus become a part of a great and living whole is a kind of satisfying pleasure nothing else can give, a participation in the very life of beauty, appreciated as much by the beholders as by the actor. This ability to confer pleasure upon one's fellows when gathered in communication or in ceremony is not the least of etiquette's rewards."