In the March 16, 1998, issue of U.S. News and World Report, David Gergen, Editor at Large, reviewed a book, One Nation, After All, by Alan Wolfe. More recently, I saw an interview on the "News Hour with Jim Lehrer" in which Gergen discussed the book with the author. Both are sources of hope.

Wolfe, a sociologist, spent two years having long interviews with typical men and women across America. He talked to them about their faith, their fears, their hopes, their values, and their dreams. He discovered that there is more sanity and common sense in America than most of us would believe.

Yet America, as presented by most news media, is a place of turmoil and uncertainty. Not so.

Wolfe found that people, given a chance to really talk about what they want and hope and believe, are tired of divisiveness and, as a group, are moving away from extremism of any kind and toward a moderate, temperate middle.

Wolfe also discovered a mature patriotism in the United States. The love of country is strong, but it has progressed past "not only the jingoism of previous years (my country, right or wrong) but also the self-loathing of the Vietnam era. Although Americans’ love of country is as strong as ever, it has been leavened with a more nuanced realism. Now, their greatest concern is that political leaders have abused the public trust and government no longer commands the respect it once did."

Another way to say this is that the nation is discovering the virtues of equilibrium and toleration. I need not tell you that those great virtues are taught in Degree after Degree of the Scottish Rite. The Rite warns against excesses of any kind. Hatred, tyranny, and oppression are excesses. It is really that simple.

The Scottish Rite of Freemasonry has always been a voice for reason. As with all organizations, our practice has sometimes failed to reach the standard of our teachings, but we have tried to hold high the great lessons of toleration, thoughtfulness, charity for the opinion of others, and forgiveness.

We have taught these lessons because they work. Masonry concerns itself with the practical problems of living, and one cannot live well if one is intolerant, careless of the thoughts and feelings of others, or mean spirited and unforgiving.

From time to time, some people question whether the Rite and its teachings are "relevant" to the world in which we live. The answer is an obvious "Yes!" We are and have been one of the sources of hope for the world.