Salt Lake City, UT – On Monday morning, the Church of Jesus
Christ of Latter-Day Saints formally announced its intent to petition the Grand
Lodge of Utah for inclusion as an officially recognized Masonic appendant body
within the grand jurisdiction. In a
statement made on the steps outside of the church’s largest temple, Salt Lake
Temple, Elder Joe Smythe explained the church’s rationale behind this historic
move toward inclusion. “The move comes on the heels of months of in-depth
research into the history of both our own church and the organization known as
Freemasonry. It came to our attention several months ago that the Church and
Freemasonry share similar grips, words, underwear, and other modes of
recognition. Naturally, we launched a comprehensive investigation immediately.
Given overwhelming evidence, we can now conclude that both organizations were
divinely—albeit separately—inspired. It is only natural that we seek to make our
disparate bodies whole, as God intended.”
When asked about the church’s long-term goals for Masonic
integration, Elder Joe explained that recognition in Utah was only the
beginning: “Of course we want to make this change at a global scale. We see the
LDS Church fitting in very well in the York Rite chain of appendant bodies, and
we will be contacting the Grand Encampment of Knights Templar to explore this
further. As the Book of Mormon is the natural capstone to the Christian Bible,
so should the LDS Church be the capstone to the ‘Christian’ branch of
Freemasonry.” However, Elder Joe added that the inclusion of the LDS Church in
the York Rite would necessitate some changes in practices on the part of the
GEKT: “Naturally, any man who wants to join the LDS Church as a Masonic
appendant body must go through the Knights Templar orders first — provided the
GEKT stops serving wine during the Order of the Temple. We simply can’t budge
on that one.”
Elder Joe appeared unfazed when he was questioned on the
possibility of the shared organizational modes of recognition arising due to
Joseph Smith’s affiliation with Freemasonry prior to founding the Church. “That
makes complete sense!” Elder Joe exclaimed, “Naturally, Brother Joseph
imparted his secrets to Freemasonry in its infancy, ensuring the two
organizations would carry on his divine inspiration!”
This writer of The
Past Bastard remains cautiously optimistic about the ability of the LDS
Church to provide a substantial contributions to Freemasonry as a whole. In fact,
if the church ever re-institutes the doctrine of polygamy or practice of plural
marriage, it might very well singlehandedly bring women’s bodies and youth
organizations back from the brink of extinction.
The Grand Lodge of Utah did not immediately return calls
requesting comment.
-SK Bro. Mason Burhmaster
