Joseph Smith And The Masons (Part 1)
Channel: Following Jesus - TheLDSLife
Date: 2010-02-08

For a closer look at the mural found at the San Vitale Basilica Chapel to make your own comparison, click: http://www.sacred-destinations.com/italy/ravenna-san-vitale
http://lds-studies.blogspot.com/2011/05/seal-of-melchizedek-eight-pointed-star.html
The ritual is changed to meet the needs of members and to better communicate the endowment to them. Remember, there is a difference between the endowment ritual and the endowment itself. The ritual is not the endowment, but how the endowment is taught-in much the same way that the Catholic Mass is not Holy Communion but how Holy Communion is given to the congregation. 
This video aims to and hits a bulls eye when it comes to showing that ritual and that becoming perfected has been and always SHOULD be found in the true, Christian church. (See Matthew 5:48/ Revelations 1:5-6, 3:19-21)
People can look at this video all they want and deny it flatly to its face... but this information is real. Other similar mosaics also show temple worship much like the kind we do. NOTHING we do in the temple is unique or strange compared to what was practiced in the "House of Israel." We still anoint and wash ourselves in preparation to enter the Lord's house to receive additional instruction. (See Exodus 29)

This resembles, in part, the temple endowment. I personally have gone through the temple for myself and countless times for others; (ie, temple work for proxy for and in behalf of others) and to me, this resembles what we do in the temple. It's not weird or cult-ish but a restored practice lost from long ago.

For more information on the message of Jesus Christ and the restoration of his church, visit  http://www.lds.org