{"id":2294,"date":"2014-10-11T11:27:59","date_gmt":"2014-10-11T18:27:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/theeduca.mywhc.ca\/?p=2294"},"modified":"2014-10-11T11:27:59","modified_gmt":"2014-10-11T18:27:59","slug":"surprised-joy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ashlarcollege.ca\/ashlar-archived\/surprised-joy\/","title":{"rendered":"Surprised by Joy"},"content":{"rendered":"

SURPRISED BY JOY!<\/span>
\nBy: Walter M. Macdougall
\nPiscataquis Lodge # 44 Grand Lodge of Maine Deputy Grand Master<\/p>\n

Brother Johan Wolfgang Von Goethe wrote that:
\n“Freemasonry is about life. It is about living our lives with a special responsibility and with a certain joy<\/span>”
\nThe Mason\u2019s ways are A type of Existence, And his persistence Is as the days are Of men in this world<\/p>\n

Freemasonry was for Goethe a grand, earnest, solemn business.
\nIt was about making a \u201cchoice\u201d which he says is both \u201cbrief and yet endless,\u201d
\na choice which is made before \u201cregarding eyes… in eternity\u2019s stillness.\u201d Goethe\u2019s words strike us where we live.
\nIt is difficult to be nonchalant about the living situation in which we find ourselves.
\nWe are bumped and shoved into an awareness that we have entered upon a perilous journey\u2014
\nboth \u201cwe\u201d individually and \u201cwe\u201d as neighbors.
\nWe find ourselves dwelling upon upheavals and between crises. Brother Goethe was right.
\nLife is a matter of making a choice which is brief yet endless\u2014
\nbrief in terms of our little lives, endless in human significance.
\nAs all Freemasons must know, the choice of which Goethe speaks is between the Light and the Darkness.<\/p>\n

Freemasonry is about life and about the all important choice of how a life shall be lived and spent.
\nFreemasonry is serious business. It involves a special moral responsibility to the well being of the
\nwhole community, but there is more. As our ritual puts it, our Masonic responsibilities are to be both
\nour duty and our happiness.
\nAbove and beyond the sobering concerns of our Masonic practice, we find ourselves
\n(to use C.S. Lewis\u2019s wonderful phrase) continually \u201csurprised by joy !\u201d<\/span>
\nSuch experiences most often come not in exceptional, epiphanatic events but rather amidst our daily
\nand ordinary lives. In fact, it is in these moments when the commonplace and the usual are suddenly
\nmade extraordinary, when there is suddenly revealed new significance or new beauty,
\nor when a new empathy between human beings smiles that we find ourselves surprised by joy.<\/p>\n

Surprised by joy!<\/span> Recently I had such an experience.
\nBrowsing in a book store, I came across David Macaulay\u2019s delightful book of sketches and commentary
\nentitled: Cathedral, the Story of Its Construction. As I turned the pages, there came one of those moments
\nwhen concepts long in the making suddenly coalesce and meanings converge into a new wholeness.
\nI was filled with a renewed awe at the enormity of the Medieval masons\u2019 endeavor
\nand thrilled with their accomplishment. How did they dare such an impertinence against gravity?
\nWho had the courage to work on the lashed pole standing more than one hundred feet above the ground?
\nWhat faith gave heartbeat to this stupendous engineering and endurance?
\nAbove all there came a new realization of the marvelous extent to which the older operative practices still
\nenlighten our speculative endeavor.<\/p>\n

Macaulay chronicles the construction of Chartreaux Cathedral, and his sketches give a vividness to the
\nwhole building operation. Here, for instance, built between the buttress piers and against the cathedral wall
\nare depicted the lodges where the masons labored, planned, and looked after the needs of their brethren.
\nIn these lodges those freshly come to the labor were entered as apprentices, those who had learned
\ntheir trade were made fellows of the craft, and the masters of the work drew details upon the trestle boards.<\/p>\n

There must have been problems aplenty in those operative lodges\u2014even grimness and despair.
\nFor eighty-six years these masons, generation on generation, labored through exciting moments
\nand discouraging times. For five years there was no work at all until more money could be raised.
\nThe original master of the work grew too old to oversee the operations.
\nThe master who took his place died of a fall from the vaulting scaffolding
\nbefore the cathedral was dedicated.
\nThis is a story of human vision, sacrifice, tragedy and persistence.<\/p>\n

One fact is clear, for those who labored in these lodges built against the cathedral walls
\nthere could have been no doubt as to their mission nor the importance of their work.
\nThe building itself defined their worth in their own eyes and in the opinion of the community.
\nTo them there must have come moments of joy when what had been so carefully crafted
\nwas hoisted into place and became part of the growing fabric\u2014
\nwhen stone by stone the magnificent nave enclosed the space where a multitude of people would look up
\nand feel themselves in the very presence of God. Surprised by joy!<\/span><\/p>\n

I was having one of those Masonic moments when one feels a sense of the builder\u2019s vision
\nand of purpose shared.
\nHow closely the parallels run between ourselves and those builders of the cathedrals!
\nFrom their lodges built against the cathedral walls, they came forth trained in the use of their
\nworking tools, united in a network of belonging and shared purpose, and directed by a vision made
\nmanifest in well laid plans. They would build a high place of worship which let in the Light.
\nIn a harmony of parts, in soaring lines which lifted the spirit heavenward,
\nand with a moral geometry they consummated their choice, their purpose and their reason for being.
\nNor was this their vision alone. It found reality in the need of the community\u2014
\nthe felt need to create a glorious place of connection between the dimness of this world
\nand God\u2019s resplendent kingdom.<\/p>\n

As our operative brethren came forth from their lodges trained as builders,
\nso we emerge from our speculative lodges inspired and fitted for our task.
\nWe come forth as heirs to a rich tapestry of allegory\u2014
\nthat ancient understanding in which we have received our preparation.
\nWhat an essential, inspired and ongoing training it is filled with the human adventure
\nand a reverence for that which lies beyond our understanding and within the glory of God.
\nUnder a constellation of symbols, we have seen a vision and acquired an art.
\nIt was Thomas Carlyle who put the essential nature of such an education in these words:
\n\u201cIt is through symbols that man unconsciously and consciously lives, works and has his being.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Through such a language of symbols we have received our skills as builders,
\nand it is through this vital medium that we continue to learn.
\nHow often here in our lodges of preparation we are surprised by joy when a new understanding,
\nlike a burst of creative light, emerges from the ritual.<\/p>\n

Surprised by Joy!<\/span> I was talking to a group of new masons about our working tools
\nand endeavoring to explain how the square enlightens moral truths.
\nIn an effort to illustrate its operative use, I was applying the square, which I had in my hand,
\nto the edges of the podium.
\nIn that instant, it was I who was illuminated.
\nI saw anew how the square tests a right relationship between two different surfaces
\nand how the moral square of virtue speaks to a right relationship between individuals.
\nThere in a moment\u2019s understanding was expressed that \u201cI and Thou\u201d<\/span> relationship
\nwhich is so desperately needed in our world.
\nThere was an expression of what we as Freemasons have a responsibility to build\u2014
\nand build not only between individuals but between every segment within our communities
\nif there is to be a cohesion and an environment of \u201cjust relationships\u201d.<\/span>
\nHere from this ancient symbol of the Craft spoke the urgency of just correspondences\u2014
\nthe relationships of the square, the right angle, between the level of equality and the plumb of rectitude.
\nThus does our Masonic education continually enlarge our understanding,
\ngive us our calling and in joy send us out to labor.<\/p>\n

Today our Masonic lodges stand close by the human community in which we are to build.
\nMoreover, as in the case of our ancient brethren,
\nthe urgency of our calling arises not only in our Masonic vision but in the needs of our communities.
\nIn this response to needs both challenging and sobering also lies our happiness.<\/p>\n

In the installation charge to the master of a Masonic lodge there is the following perennial
\nand wise admonition which needs to be kept fresh in our minds:
\nCharge the brethren to practice outside of the lodge those virtues they have learned in it;
\nso that when a man is said to be a member of it,
\nthe world may know that he is one to whom the burdened heart may pour out its sorrows,
\nto whom distress may prefer its suit,
\nwhose arm is strengthened by justice
\nand whose heart is expanded by benevolence.<\/p>\n

This is our calling; to be responders to the needs of our communities in the midst of darkening times,
\nto be choosers of the Light, \u201crestorers of peace to troubled minds,<\/span>\u201d forgers of partnerships in purpose,
\npractitioners of a moral geometry whose axioms are tried and unfailing principles,
\nto be demanders of equality based upon the dignity of all human beings, to be voices with instructive tongues,
\nseekers with attentive ears, searchers after wisdom, and believers in the possibility of a better world.<\/p>\n

With such responsibilities and visions, we Freemasons come forth from our symbolic lodges.
\nAnd in the morning of a new century, we shall find our strength and our prosperity\u2014our reason for being.
\nWe shall find all these things in the consummation of our building.<\/p>\n

Goethe was right. “Freemasonry is a grand, earnest, solemn business”,<\/span>
\nbut as he also knew, our happiness lies in our response to the serious duties of Freemasonry.
\nFor that eternal Light does run through all that we do and shall experience in the name of
\nbrotherly love, relief and truth, and over and over again and most often when we least expect it,<\/p>\n

we shall be surprised by joy!<\/span><\/h3>\n

Comment<\/span>
\nSearch and ye shall find!!!!! What an introduction to the need for “Masonic Education”<\/p>\n

I found this beautiful gem in my Library, where I store papers that have been shared
\nwith me over the years & waiting for the right moment to be discovered.
\nHere it is!!! and now it is spreading even more light.<\/p>\n

Outside of the credit given in the heading of this paper, I have no knowledge of the writer or even
\nwhen it was written.
\nHaving said that, should anyone have knowledge of those details I would love to add then to the Header<\/p>\n

Thank you all for allowing me to share with you.
\nHave a wonderful day & God Bless
\nNorm<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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