From: michael@adriaan.bu.edu (Michael Chaplin)
Newsgroups: alt.pagan
Subject: Re: Templars not Masons <was: Re: Who/what is Baphomet?>
Date: 14 Sep 92 20:19:46 GMT
	<2AA2D891.25314@orion.oac.uci.edu>
	<1992Sep1.215227.25020@access.digex.com>
Organization: Boston University
In-reply-to: corun@access.digex.com's message of 1 Sep 92 21:52:27 GMT

In article <1992Sep1.215227.25020@access.digex.com> corun@access.digex.com (Corun MacAnndra) writes:

   >I'm kind of interested, too.  I've evidently not given them enough
   >mental air time; they always seemed a little like Fred Flintstone's
   >Loyal Order of Water Buffalos.  Seems I'm due for a reality check, huh?
   >(I've also heard things about how they are closely related to the
   >Mormons.)

   Mormons related to Masons? Now that scares the hell out of me. I've known
   many Mormons, and while on the surface they're very nice, there's a very
   spooky quality underneath. Especially those who are most active in the
   church. To be fair I haven't known (that I'm aware of) any Masons, and so
   I can't say if the same quality is there. I've always seen Masons as rather
   benign and benificent. Take the Children's Hospitle for example. They don't
   seem to segregate except where it directly concerns their rites. This is
   true of many religions where the actual rites are concerned. I went to a
   Greek Orthodox wedding once and the priest disappeared into a little room
   behind the alter for awhile. Noone else is allowed in. But the Mormons,
   they segregate everyone not a Mormon every day. They even segregate their
   own if they feel that one is not performing to the church's standards.

Just recently I posted to alt.conspiracy about the connection between
the Church of JC and the Latter Day Saints (Mormons) and Freemasonry.
I assume, of course, that not everybody reads it (we all have our
favorites) and so I'll try to reconstruct what I said.

The connection is only the marked influence of Freemasonic ritual
upon certain rituals of the Mormon church. The influence occured
when the Mormons, in their trek west from upstate New York settled
in Nauvoo, which was, if I'm not mistaken, in southern Illinois.
While there, many of the church elders were made Masons at the 
behest of Joseph Smith, the church founder. Smith himself had been
made a Mason at Nauvoo. The Mormon Masonic Lodges were later declared
"clandestine", which, in Masonic parlance is equivalent to
"unrecognized"- certainly not as strong as "excommunicated".
The reasons given had to do with an inordinate amount of altering
of the rite and ritual. (Masonic ritual will stand *some* variation-
just not as much as what was said to be done.) The Mormons were
later chased from Nauvoo for reasons only indirectly related, and
they then made their way to Utah. Thus, the Mormons preserved some
of the Freemasonic ritual. This, of course, does not make every
Mormon a Mason, or vice versa. Just those who join both can be
called both.

Most of this is from memory from an article in The Little Masonic
Encyclopedia on Masonry and Mormonism.

Not a Mormon, not a Mason, but I do have Hazel Eyes (tm).

'til later,
Chaplin.

--
===========================================================================
Michael Chaplin                    Language is a virus from outer space.
michael@albert.bu.edu                     - William S. Burroughs

The Einstein Papers Project        The opinions contained herein reflect
Boston University                      neither those of the project, 
Boston, Massachusetts, U.S.A.          nor those of Albert Einstein.
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