The essential qualification for admission into and continuing membership is a belief in a Supreme Being.
Membership is open to men of any race or religion who can fulfil this essential qualification and who are of good repute.
Each Freemason is required to learn and show humility through initiation. Then, by progression through a series of degrees he gains insight into increasingly complex moral and philosophical concepts, and accepts a variety of challenges and responsibilities which are both stimulating and rewarding. The structure and working of the lodge and the sequence of ceremonial events, which are usually followed by social gatherings, offer members a framework for companionship, teamwork, character development and enjoyment of shared experiences.
In Freemasonry, instruction is based on symbolism but brainwashing, or thought reform, is not used. Cults influence members by means of a coordinated program of psychological and social influence techniques. Freemasonry allows each member to provide his own interpretation of the symbols involved and no one interpretation is deemed to be correct to the exclusion of all others. Witness the many interpretations given by various Masonic writers over the centuries.... Religious intolerants will attempt to label this or that individual's interpretation as representative of Freemasonry but nothing could be further from the truth. What any other Mason (including the oft-misquoted Masonic authors like Albert Pike) sees in the symbolism of the Trowel, for example, may be far different from what I as a Mason see - yet neither of us is wrong.
There is no single leader of Freemasonry. There are hundreds of Grand Lodges throughout the world, and each is sovereign unto itself. A Grand Lodge controls only its own subordinate lodges and no others. Rules made by a Grand Lodge apply only to its own members.
