Just when I thought I'd seen all the stupid anti-Masonic videos that whacked-out fundamentalist Christians could create and upload to YouTube, along comes Masonic Pet Goat of Nine-One-One: Presidential Bow Before Bel.
The video is produced by a Christian group calling itself "Protestant Separatist," whose motto seems to be drawn from 2nd Corinthians 6:17, which says, "Therefore come out from them and be separate, says the Lord. Touch no unclean thing, and I will receive you."
The group "Protestant Separatist" appears to be the brainchild of Stephen Michael Schroeder, an Indianapolis man with a grudge against Catholics and Freemasons. On the group's home page we learn that the character of Uncle Sam is based on Baphomet. No, really. Superimpose the images and you get, well, you get a superimposed image of Uncle Sam over Baphomet. That's proof enough, isn't it?
Judging from the article on his webpage called "I Stand Alone," we can assume his group is made up of, oh, maybe one person.
Warning — Low blow but I can't help myself: Stephen Michael Schroeder wears his hair in a mullet cut. How can you take anyone seriously who sports a mullet? Even Billy Ray Cyrus had to get rid of his mullet before anyone took him seriously.
The video is a rambling, convoluted and ultimately ridiculous 10 minute montage of video and graphics, narrated by a man (Schroeder, I'm guessing) who sounds like he scarfed down a barbiturate cocktail before he began.
No facts, no information, no references... just idle chatter telling us that "the secret Masonic ritual of riding the goat" is how the "Masonic-controlled Skull & Bones" group controls the world.
It begins, accompanied by The Listening Wind by Talking Heads, by pointing out that when President George W. Bush was told about the first plane that hit the World Trade Center tower, he was in an elementary school, reading a story called The Pet Goat (not My Pet Goat, as the video says) to children.
I agree that's a pretty nifty "coincidence," and given a few minutes to think about it, I could probably write a darn good "those Satanic Masons done it" conspiracy screenplay or short story beginning with this premise. I mean, the authors of the story, which is a part of a much larger collection of children's tales designed to help kids learn to read, have conspiratorial, Bavarian-sounding names, like Siegfried and Bruner.
The video uses images of Glinda the Good Witch of the North and Popeye the Sailor to let us know, somehow, that stars and goats are the way to "conjure up the Babylonian gods of war to continue to destroy the earth, and finally to make war in heaven, until all acknowledge the goat as god."
This guy falls flat on his face with this one. I have to give this video Four (Inverted) Stars for utter stupidity.
Dr. Blanchard wasn't just against secret societies. One of his most famous sermons, "The 20th Century Christian" (given at the turn of the 20th century), slammed drinking, dancing, card-playing, the theater, and "lodgism" while promoting Sunday blue laws and putting religion into public education and national politics.
The anti-Masonic speech is refreshing in that it doesn't cite "leading Masonic writers" such as Pike, Mackey, and Hall, nor does it dwell on conspiracy theories about dollar bills, the New World Order, the Taxil hoax or anti-Catholic vendettas.
It's just a nice, long, well-reasoned discourse on why Christians shouldn't be Freemasons.
The speech was given by Dr. Charles A. Blanchard, then president of Wheaton College in Wheaton, Illinois. It was delivered on August 7, 1895, to nearly 1,600 "Christian workers" from across the country, who had assembled in Northfield, Massachusetts, for a "Conference for Christian Workers" sponsored by evangelist Dwight L. Moody.
Here, according to Dr. Blanchard, is what is wrong with Freemasonry and why Christians shouldn't be Freemasons:
The Bible already contains all the instructions for life a man needs; therefore, no other organization or doctrine is needed.
A Christian is the "Light of the World," and the Church, not Freemasonry, decides what constitutes "morality."
"It is the duty of the Church to point out the evil, not only of some sin, but of all sin." Freemasonry is sin, and therefore, trying to save a Freemason here and there isn't right; all of Freemasonry should be dismantled. "It is better to reform or hang the wreckers than to save one wreck!", Blanchard says.
As a follow up to the above reason, he says to avoid Freemasons because most aren't Christians, and thus, are "a mighty factor of evil" against the Church.
Masonry and all secret societies are secretive, and "require members to disregard the example of Christ." He exclaims that "no man can be a secret society man and follow the example of Jesus Christ!"
Freemasonry tramples upon Christ's commands by hiding things.
Citing II Corinthians 6:14, Blanchard says that Freemasonry forces men to "have fellowship with unbelievers."
Freemasonry teaches immorality. He comes to this conclusion by saying that Masonic restrictions against having "illicit carnal intercourse" with a brother's female relatives implies that it's permissible to have illicit carnal knowledge with any woman not related to a Mason.
Masonic charity is "utterly un-Christian," in that it serves only Masons and their families.
Masonry denies God's plan of salvation. "This whole system is a plan to DO AWAY WITH THE ATONEMENT OF JESUS CHRIST and to lead the poor sinner to trust man in the awful day of judgment, with no hope except what his miserable, paltry righteousness has been able to get for himself."
You "leave your Savior at the door" when you enter a Masonic temple, since the name of Jesus is not to be used in a lodge meeting.
if evangelical Christian ministers were preaching this kind of anti-Masonic rhetoric over a hundred years ago, why are so many of today's Freemasons also evangelical and fundamentalist Christians?
If you are both a Christian and a Freemason, I ask you how you justify being both, in light of Dr. Blanchard's sermon? Is he right? Wrong? Is it just his opinion or do you think he's speaking for Jesus and/or Christianity?
If he's right, then why are you a Freemason?
If he's wrong, then why are you a Christian?
Image: Rev. Charles A. Blanchard, President of Wheaton College (1882-1925). For more info on Blanchard and his Congregational religious beliefs, see this page at Wheaton's website.
Just when I think I've read all the anti-Masonic rants ever written, along comes a new one to brighten up my day.
This one has the standard "Freemasons control the world and the Illuminati control the Masons" silliness, but it takes a bizarre turn by saying that Freemasons control the world's illegal drug trade, for all drugs except marijuana.
What makes this rant unique is that it's written by a self-admitted stoner. The piece reads as if it was written by someone flying eight miles high. Twisted in with the usual Skull and Bones eye in the triangle on the dollar bill hysteria are revelations about the writer's left-handed father and personal tragedies and health issues, related through a grassy haze. He's sure that Masons "have no love in their hearts" and are the "manipulating string-pullers" of the world.
Image: The reverse side of the Great Seal of the United States, suitable for coloring, courtesy the U.S. Government Printing Office. Get your crayons out.
Bro. Erik visited the museum recently, and sent us his report. Thanks, Bro. Erik!
Confronting the Critics
"Confronting the Critics," on view at the California Grand Lodge headquarters in San Francisco through October 1st, takes a look at the history of anti-Masonic propaganda beginning with the Morgan affair all the way to the fevered imaginings of contemporary religious extremists.
As a member of a French obedience unrecognized by American Grand Lodges, this small exhibit was particularly interesting to me for the way in which it sheds light on the differing histories of continental European and Anglo/American Freemasonry and how the nature of our critics and our response to them has shaped our vastly different histories.
The exhibit begins with a look at the Morgan affair of the 1820s and 30s and how this scandal shaped the American lodge. Curator Adam Kendall says that American Masons reaction to the scandal, "was really the beginning of Masonry as we know it today in the United States, and it also created an unprecedented level of openness. At the same time, it started a process that took mainstream American Masonry in a different direction than its European counterparts."
Post-Morgan affair Freemasonry in the US went on to emphasize charitable work and operates relatively openly. But the story of continental Freemasonry evolved very differently largely because of the power and fervency of its critics, mainly the Catholic church and repressive anti-democratic governments. You’ll see no Masonic bumper stickers on the continent even today and the middle portion of "Confronting the Critics" shows why, detailing a sordid history of repression and anti-Semitism that stretches from the 18th century to the Nazis. This very different history explains in part why French Freemasonry has maintained its progressive political stance in defiance to its opponents.
The bizarre depictions of continental Masonic rituals by our opponents is a highlight in the exhibit culminating in a series of photos of a Nazi-staged reenactment of a third degree ritual replete with an incomprehensible bunch of skeletons perched on boxes scattered about the lodge room.
The exhibit ends with a set of books and a few comics by the irrepressible right wing fundamentalist nut-job Jack Chick that demonstrates that today Continental and Anglo/American Freemasonry are once again united by the fervency of our religious extremist opponents.
One sad note is the exhibit's location in a dark corner of a second floor balcony above the lobby. The Grand Lodge used to have a much larger exhibit space on the ground floor of their swanky Nob Hill headquarters but it appears to have been closed for lack of interest. Nevertheless, the content of this exhibit is much more interesting than the miscellaneous Masonic memorabilia that I viewed the last time I visited the now closed museum and “Confronting the Critics” is well worth seeing.
The exhibit is open until October 1st and can be viewed Monday 10 to 3, Wednesday 10 to 6 and Thursday 12 to 8 or by appointment. An article and some of the artifacts from the exhibit can be seen in the newsletter of the California Grand Lodge.
Bro. Greg Stewart at the Masonic Traveler blog and webmaster of FreemasonInformation.com has given an interview to an anti-Masonic website. 
