 J. Howard Duncan, 32°, K.C.C.H. Box 56, Lecompton, Kansas 66050
The rapidity of society's macro-change has made it difficult for the average person to have a full working career without retraining or becoming a job-nomad. Roots have become shallower in their anchorage with the increasing rarity of a home where one of the parents can devote full time to being a homemaker during the children's formative years. Group and community activities continue to lose ground to the individual person's singular contact with electronic devices, be it television or computer. Perhaps you joined Masons as your personal attempt to battle against the loss of identity and roots, or maybe your reason was just a hunger for good people with whom to associate. Perhaps you seek the mind-improving challenges Freemasonry offers, but does not require, in the preparation and delivery of ritual. Perhaps you enjoy fellowship and being a significant part of team accomplishment. I really don't know why you joined the Masons, but I am so glad that you are here! I freely give you my acceptance and trust, whether you are in Newfoundland, Hawaii, or Russia. It is yours to keep until you demonstrate that you are not worthy of it. Unlike in general society, Masonic trust is available in advance for your enjoyment rather than being withheld until after it has been thoroughly earned. You will learn that one of the greatest gifts of Masonry is an acceptance in strange locales when you find a Brother. Of course with that wonderful gift comes your commitment of learning trust of others. There are many things you can find and create in Freemasonry if you have the interest and are willing to make the investment of yourself. You will be offered appropriate opportunities to join with others in charitable endeavors, beyond money contributions, achieving good results through your personal efforts. If you choose to attend Lodge or Temple on a fairly regular basis, there is the major benefit of developing fellowship among the regular attendees. You will find that such fellowship is far more than you experience in the shallower contacts of your business and social worlds. You will be exposed to a variety of positive role models. There are opportunities to use these Masonic contacts as sounding boards for your actions in matters where the paths are not clearly marked right and wrong. Moral support will be offered you when facing the always-difficult decision of foregoing an immediate benefit for a long-term good. And the interesting point is that while experiencing these things, you are systematically becoming a better person. It will not be long before you are providing help and advice as well as receiving these valuable gifts. This is leadership development in its most beneficent form. Conventional leadership development is also offered you by advancing through the chairs and becoming a ritualist. Even basically shy men come to bloom under such development and lose their fear of expressing themselves in public. I do not know exactly why you joined the Masons, but I do know that through improving you, Masonry can benefit your family, your church, your community, and your country.
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I really don't know why you joined
the Masons. Perhaps it was because a relative or other person
you greatly admire seemed to value the Masonic organizations
to such an obvious extent that his pride always showed. Perhaps
it was because you personally support the Masonic principles
of individual freedoms and benevolent social behaviors, and wanted
to cast your identity as a member of such a group. Perhaps it
is because you have grown weary of the slippage of American society
into a plasticized generic pattern where identity of any kind
is in danger of becoming lost.