Attorneys duke it out in Shrine vs. Scottish Rite real estate squabble

Follow the money, if you can.

The Arabia Shrine Temple in Houston, Texas, gave an 80-year land lease to the Scottish Rite Benevolent Association in 1985. The Benevolent Association erected a lavish new building on the property, adjacent to the Shrine's building, at 7575 Brompton Road.

Together the two buildings make up the Houston area "Masonic Center."

Many blue lodges, Order of the Eastern Star, York Rite, Scottish Rite and other appendent bodies pay rent to the Benevolent Association to use the Scottish Rite Temple as their home base.

Unnamed investors want to buy the entire parcel and buildings, and the Shriners are eager to sell.

The Scottish Rite committee members aren't happy with the Shrine's buy-out offer. The Shrine has threatened to sue the Scottish Rite if they don't accept the settlement offer. The Scottish Riters have countered with their own attorneys.

Source: Houston Scottish Rite Bulletin

Image: The Masonic Center in Houston, Texas

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Masonic funerals: Two shows daily!

It looks like Masonic ritual and ceremony has been reduced to mere show, at least for an upcoming weekend festival in Texas.

Drop by the Texas Independence Day Celebration at Washington-on-the-Brazos State Historic Site at 11 a.m. or 1 p.m. on Saturday, March 3, or 10:30 a.m. and 12 p.m on Sunday, March 4, and you'll get to see a "Masonic burial re-enactment." Never mind they don't have a body to bury in this most solemn of all Masonic rituals. They're pretending to bury Sam Houston, who served as president of the Republic of Texas, senator for Texas after it joined the Union, and finally as governor.

He was ousted as governor when the Civil War began because although he was a slaveowner and an opponent of abolitionism, he refused to support the Confederacy when Texas seceded from the Union.

Houston was made a Freemason in Tennessee. Along with Stephen Austin and Anson Jones, Houston helped form the first Masonic lodge in Texas. Many of the men who died at the Alamo were Masons, including James Bonham, Almaron Dickinson, Davy Crockett, James Bowie and William Barret Travis.

While you are at the Celebration, you can see plays and "living history actors" portray many of the early settlers of Texas. And if you're lucky, you can share a "Texas-sized" birthday cake with the great-grandson of Sam Houston.

Image: A Masonic funeral procession in Michigan, circa 1917

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