Pasadena Scottish Rite Pasadena Scottish Rite

14 Pasadena Scottish Rite Bulletin
Pasadena Scottish Rite Bulletin 3
work. He who cannot find his payment in his satisfaction of a task
well done will receive no Master’s Wages for his labors on Lodge
committees.
There are brethren to be taught. Learning all the “work” is a
man’s task, not to be accomplished in a hurry. Yet it is worth the doing,
and in instructing officers and candidates many a Mason has found a
quiet joy which is Master’s Wages pressed down and running over.
Service leads to the possibility of appointment or election to the line of
officers. There is little to speak of the Master’s Wages this opportunity
pays, because only those who have occupied the Oriental Chair know
what they are. The outer evidence of the experience may be told, but the
inner spiritual experience is untellable because the words have not been
invented.
But Past Masters know! To them is issued a special coinage of
Master’s Wages which only a Worshipful Master may earn. Ask any of
them if they do not pay well for the labor.
If practical Master’s Wages are acquaintances in Lodge, the
enjoyment of fellowship, merged into friendship, is the same payment
in larger form. Difficult to describe, the sense of being one of a group,
the solidarity of the circle which is the Lodge, provides a satisfaction
and pleasure impossible to describe as it is clearly to be felt. It is
interesting to meet many men of many walks of life; it is heart- warming
continually to meet the same group, always with the same feeling of
equality. High and low, rich and poor, merchant and money-changer,
banker and broom-maker, doctor and ditch-digger all meet on the level,
and find it happy - Master’s Wages, value untranslatable into money.
Finally - and best - is the making of many friends.
Thousands of brethren count their nearest and their dearest friends on
the rolls of the Lodge they love and serve. The Mystic Tie makes for
friendship It attracts man to man and often draws together “those who
might otherwise have remained at a perpetual distance.”
Count gain for work well done in what coin seems most
valuable; the dearest of the intangibles which come to any Master
Mason are those Masonic friendships than which there “are” no greater
Master’s Wages.
For further light, check out TheMasonicTrowel.com.
W. Joseph Ryland, 33°
Master of Kadosh
Consistory
We have done it again, we have gone
and completed another Masonic year and
spread our Scottish Rite values throughout
Freemasonry. Once again we must go boldly
forth into the new year of 2011 spreading the
Scottish Rite message wherever this bulletin
gets read.
We have several goals for the new
year: First, to continue to seek Master Masons
who will benefit from the additional light of
Freemasonry that the Scottish Rite provides.
Second, to give every Scottish Rite brother the
brotherly love, care, and nurturing that is due a Masonic brother. Third, to
strive to improve in all aspects so that the Valley of Pasadena will continue
to exemplify that excellence for which we have a well-deserved reputation.
No one can feel the warmth and understanding of being a
Scottish Rite Mason without the experience of partaking, believing, and
participating in the bonds of friendship and brotherly love that exist at the
Valley of Pasadena. Soon, our Valley will conduct the annual installation
of officers where we will pass the mantle of responsibility to new hands.
We have no doubt that the new officers of all four bodies will lead us in a
way that will make us all proud beyond our greatest expectations. So, as a
final wish, I say to you God Bless America and God Bless you all.
General George Washington once decreed, “When we assumed the soldier, we
did not lay aside the citizen.” How insightful he was in this observation. For
many former soldiers have now returned home and are the citizens who live
next door, the worker standing at the tool and die machine next to you, and
the mechanic who services your car at the local Ford dealership.
- Capt. Jerry Moon, USA