1968
GRAND LODGE OF MISSOURI
21c
LOUISIANA: The Grand Lodge of Louisiana withdrew recognition of the Grand Lodge of France after hearing the following report: Your committee having been made aware of certain irregularities occurring in the Grand Lodge of France proceeded to make an exhaustive study of the situation in this Grand Lodge and find the following: 1. A belief in God is no longer required in this Grand Lodge. 2. The Volume of the Sacred Law is no longer an essential part of the furniture of the Lodge. 3. This Grand Lodge has resumed relations with the Grand Orient of France, a group considered clandestine since 1877 when they removed the Holy Bible from their lodges and rescinded a belief in God as a requirement for membership.
FREDERICKSBURG RECORD BOOK WEST VIRGINIA: The Grand Lodge of West Virginia held a special communication of the Grand Lodge for the purpose of considering the proper exhibition of the Grand Lodge copy of the reproduction of the Record Book of the Old Lodge at Fredericksburg. This special communication was held at St. Albans, December 3, 1966, and is of some historical significance. A partial account of this communication is as follows: The book of which our reproduction will be exhibited here today has always been called the Record Book of the Old Lodge at Fredericksburg. It is perhaps properly so called because it is hardly a minute book in the sense we now use those words today. It contains the minutes of the communications of the lodge, but the language is so terse and the information so scanty that we might consider them as notes from which to prepare minutes, rather than minutes themselves. They state the date of meeting, the names and stations of the officers, the names of the brethren present, and with stark brevity the work done or business transacted. Thus the famous entries with respect to George 'Washington merely say. "George Washington entered apprentice," "George Washington passed Fellow Craft," and "George Washington raised Master Mason"-no word as to lectures or charges, or balloting or advancement. Fortunately, from other evidence, principally the Exposures published in the first half of the Eighteenth Century, we are able to reconstruct with reasonable certainty the ritual Washington received. The laconic statements in the minutes do not contradict the evidence we have as to more extended ceremony and teaching. Rather these statements are eloquent evidence of the strictness with which our ancient brethren regarded what was proper to be written and the much wider scope of secrecy in Masonic affairs which they observed. In addition to the minutes the Book contains what we would nowadays call a cash journal-a careful accounting of the receipts and disbursements of the lodge. From it we may reconstruct a picture of the furniture and jewels, the Masonic clothing, and the refreshment of the brethren-all creating the aura and atmosphere of Ancient Craft Masonry. \Ve also learn with what careful husbandry the funds of the lodge were corralled and devoted to :\1asonic purposes.-qualities of integrity which were carried over into public life of the State and Federal governments by the founders of our great country. In addition to the record of the making of Washington a Mason, the Book also contains the earliest known written record of the conferring of the Royal Arch Degree, either in this country or abroad. It proves beyond any doubt that the Holy Royal Arch developed in the Ancient Craft lodges and that Capitular Masonry is truly a part of what we have come to call the Royal Art. In less than 25 years after Washington was raised he assumed command of the