Brent Morris is a member and Past Master of Patmos
Lodge #70, Ellicott City, Maryland. He is currently working
on an update of the Scottish Rite (NJ) publication "Masonic
Charities" of which this STB is an extract. Bro Morris is
a well known Masonic author and we at MSA thank him for
putting the Masonic Charities information together for us.
Within the text are several references to early examples of
Masonic Charity, MSA would be very interested in learning
if there are earlier examples than the ones quoted. If you
know of an earlier Masonic charitable act that occurred
within the United States or Canada please let us know.
--- Editor
AND THE GREATEST
OF THESE IS CHARITY
by S. Brent Morris, P.M.
Charity is a universal characteristic of
Freemasonry. Whether help for a community
offered by a local lodge, or a Masonic home
supported by a State Grand Lodge, or the national network of Childhood Language
Disorders centers maintained by local Scottish Rite Brethren and the Supreme Council,
S.J., or the Shriners' hospitals for crippled
children, American Masons are part of a
centuries-old tradition of caring. It doesn't
matter if it's a Lodge, a Consistory, or a
Masonic stamp club, cach will have charity
as a significant part of its activities. However
varied the activity, each effort has one goal:
helping those in need.
A study of Masonic Charities is a study of
the evolving needs of American society. When
food and shelter were immediate and almost
daily concerns, Masons responded with firewood and the fruits of their harvests. When
care of the aged, widows, and orphans were
worries, Masons erected retirement homes
and orphanages. When education was
needed, Masons built schools, and when these
basic needs moved ever farther from common
experience, Masons turned their philanthropy
to crippled children, burn victims, the speech
and language impaired, cancer patients, and
others.
As with most human endeavors, Masonic
actions speak louder than Masonic words.
Consider the first two official actions of the
Grand Lodge of Rhode Island after organizing and installing its officers on June 27, 1791.
[T]he Brethren walked in Regular Procession to Trinity Church where an Excellent
discourse was delivered by the Reverend
William Smith, Rector thereof, & a collection made of $11.9.4 Law. Money to be
invested into Wood & distributed to the
Poor of this Town the ensuing Winter.
Proceedings oJ the M.W.G.L.
of Rhode Island
Even our courts have taken judicial notice
of the Masonic tradition of caring:
The objects and purposes of said
Order are to nurse, carefor and to provide for its sick, afflicted and needy
members und their families, bury the
dead, care for the widows of its deceased
members, and care for and educate their
orphan children, and to inculcate in its
members the principles of morality,
temperance, benevolence and charity and
teach them their duly and true fraternal
relationship to mankind.
Denser v. State of Missouri (1947)
With this rich tradition of sharing comes
the Masonic ideal of anonymous good works
(exemplified by the Scottish Rite Almoner).
This presents a problcm for historians: How
can lhe extent of Masonic charity be recorded
in the face of a conscious effort to keep it very
private? The dilemma was partially solved by
the book Masonic Charities, edited by
Brothers John H. Van Gordon and Stewart
M. L. Pollard and publishcd in 1985 by the
Supreme Council, N.M.J. At that time
Brother Van Gordon undertook the unique
(and daunting) task of accounting for every
dollar spent on charity by American Masons
in 1985. An updated and rewritten form of
this important volume with figures for 1990
is now being prepared and will be published jointly by the Northern and Southern
Supreme Councils. A brief preview of this
new book follows.
In the developmcnt of social scrvices in the
emerging nation, the Masonic dcfinition of
charity diverged sharply from that of many
statcs. Dorothy Ann Lipson captured this idea
clearly in her 1977 book, Freemasonry in
Federalist Connecticut.
Masonic charity differed in its underlying assumptions and in its slyle from
civic charity. In Connecticut charity was
available to the settled members of a
town, regulated by law, and invoked in
times of extreme need and as a last resort.
Persistent vestiges of the older Puritan
ethic; which associated misfortune wilh
divine retribution, made appeals to civic
charity a painful necessity. Masonic
charity, more broadly defined than its
civic counterpart, was availahle to its
members in times of personal crisis
wherever they were. (p. 213)
Masonic charity was secret unlike civic
charily whose administration made the
enlire town privy to the needs of each
recipient. The derogalion of character
implicit in acknowledging poverty must
have compounded suffering. In contrast
the Masons asked, " What has the world
to do with private transactions, whether
a widow, an orphan, or a pilgrim has
obtained relief ?'' (p 207)
A touching examplc of this private, compassionate relief during personal crisis is cited
by Prof. Dumenil on pages 208-209. Federal
Lodge in Watertown, Connecticut purchased
a cow for thc use of a widow and her children,
and the cow was carried on its books for
several years as a Lodge asset, presumably to
spare the family the embarrassment of acccpting charity.
From the very earliest days of Masonry in
America, charity has been a conccrn. Look
at the following extract from the 1733 By-
Laws of the First Lodge of Boston, believcd
to be the oldest record of American Masons
setting aside funds for charity:
IXthly Every Member shall pay at
Least two shillings more per Quarter to
be applied as Charity Towards the Relief
of poor Brethren.
While charity assessments were a common
feature of many early American Lodges, their
records are shy about specific instances of
private relief. The first explicit record of
Masonic relief in America seems to be in the
Lodge at Fredericksburgh, Virginia. On
November 4, 1754, "a petition from a
member and indigent Brother, John Spotwood, was read, and on motion of the Lodge,
he was given one pound 12 shillings and sixpence 'to relieve his necessity.' " (R. Heaton
and J. Case, The Lodge at Fredericksburgh,
P. 34)
Grasping the subtle nuances of the interlocking relationships of Masonic organizations is a simple task compared to cataloging their expenditures. As Prof. Lipson
observed, ''Masonic charity was secret unlike
civic charity whose administration made the
entire town privy to the needs of each recipient. "Thus the researcher can only capture
the data from aid that went through formally
organized and public Masonic activities, but
even this doesn't tell the whole story."
For example, the Masonic Service Association quietly oversees a Hospital Visitation
Program with a goal that every V.A. Hospital
in the United States have a Masonic volunteer
working with patients. How can a value be
placed on the more than 500,000 hours a year
spent on this work? It just can't be done! The
best that can be done is to catalog that fraction of Masonic philanthropy that happens
to be administered on a formal basis and to
rest content in the knowledge that Masons
today, as always, are seeking to provide relief
for suffering humanity.
The new book divides American Masonic
philanthropies into several major categories:
I) public hospitals and clinics; 2) medical
research; 3) Masonic homes, hospitals, and
orphanages; 4) scholarships and youth;
S) museums and public buildings; and
6) community support. Each category
represents the efforts of hundreds of
thousands of American Masons to put
Masonic teachings into practice. The book
will try to give a detailed analysis of each
category.
The bottom line is this:
ln 1990, American Masonic
philanthropy was over $360
million, or more than $986
thousand per day, of which
over 70% went to the
American public.
Public Hospitals and Clinics
Medical research
Masonic Homes and Orphanages
Scholarships, Youth, & Museums
Community Support
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