Freemasonry’s ‘inviolable secrecy’ is elusive and powerful. It inspires loyalty and attracts trouble. It is the engine of the fascination and fear that have always surrounded the Freemasons.
Freemasonry, for the men with access to its mysteries, offers a fellowship that transcends all differences of race, religion, and class. It provides a lifelong spiritual apprenticeship—a moral system for building better men in the same way that the stonemasons of old built castles and cathedrals.
For the Masons’ many enemies, secrecy makes Freemasonry suspect: a sexist cabal of self-promoters whose code of covert mutual assistance is a menace for a free and open society.
The abyss of misunderstanding between the two sides has marked the history of Freemasonry for three centuries, turning the Masonic dream of a brotherhood rooted in symbols and rituals into one of the most contagious ideas of the modern age.
Secrecy is the key to Masonic history in that, if we can grasp it, we can unlock a rich store of narratives about how the world we live in was made.
Read The Craft, and reveal the secrets.