What's the toughest job you've had in Freemasonry?

I just wrote to 4 brothers telling them I will exclude them at 30 June if they do not pay their fees or contact me. That was not fun.

Masonic Funerals. I think they are great and I want one, but the two times I've been asked to do it I've declined because I was quite sure I would not have kept my composure.

What's the toughest job you've had in Freemasonry ?

I have to agree that telling a brother that he is about to be suspended for non-payment is tough.
I have participated in a couple of Masonic funerals and my faith in knowing they are in a much better place and no longer in pain allowed me to keep my composure.

Jr and Sr Decon because I cant hardly cook anything but beans

Obeying a Summons to appear as a witness in a Masonic trial. I'd rather travel around the world than have to step past a Tiler to attend such a meeting.

Stepping up to the microphone at GL to speak to 1400+ Brothers against a proposal written by an elected grand officer. Going through the line gives us practice in public speaking but the scale of an Annual Communication is so much larger.

dfreybur said:

Obeying a Summons to appear as a witness in a Masonic trial. I'd rather travel around the world than have to step past a Tiler to attend such a meeting.

Stepping up to the microphone at GL to speak to 1400+ Brothers against a proposal written by an elected grand officer. Going through the line gives us practice in public speaking but the scale of an Annual Communication is so much larger.

Click to expand...

+1 on the trial...
Also, being called up to speak at Grand Lodge unexpectedly, and defend a proposal an absent Brother wrote.

Chairman of jurisprudence for a national Masonic body during a time when the DGM was removed and charges drafted against a former elected officer; the first few weeks as GM when I had to remove a lodge officer from my lodge due conduct and other issues with very difficult behavior by members of the fraternity

This is funny .... after the fact, but it was as frustrated as I've even been:

I was conferring an EA once, and the candidate was deaf as a post. He had no clue what I said from the East when he was standing before the altar. When I was obligating him - maybe two feet away from either side of the altar - I was yelling almost at the top of my lungs. All his repeat after me's were "huh?" "what did you say?" "can you say that again?" I was so out of sorts by the end of it, I might have obligated him into the military or married him.

Companion Joe said:

This is funny .... after the fact, but it was as frustrated as I've even been:

I was conferring an EA once, and the candidate was deaf as a post. He had no clue what I said from the East when he was standing before the altar. When I was obligating him - maybe two feet away from either side of the altar - I was yelling almost at the top of my lungs. All his repeat after me's were "huh?" "what did you say?" "can you say that again?" I was so out of sorts by the end of it, I might have obligated him into the military or married him.

Click to expand...

When I went through the chairs in England I obligated all three degrees. On one occasion, the candidate simply couldn't understand my American accent and the SD had to interpret between English dialects

Glen Cook said:

When I went through the chairs in England I obligated all three degrees. On one occasion, the candidate simply couldn't understand my American accent and the SD had to interpret between English dialects

Click to expand...

That's funny. I've seen similar instances here where someone has a strong Appalachian accent, and their pronunciation is so far off, the candidate repeats what he thinks he hears, but that wasn't what was said.

In the situation I mentioned, I refused to confer the guy's FC and MM degrees. Someone else had to do it.

Companion Joe said:

This is funny .... after the fact, but it was as frustrated as I've even been:

I was conferring an EA once, and the candidate was deaf as a post. He had no clue what I said from the East when he was standing before the altar. When I was obligating him - maybe two feet away from either side of the altar - I was yelling almost at the top of my lungs. All his repeat after me's were "huh?" "what did you say?" "can you say that again?" I was so out of sorts by the end of it, I might have obligated him into the military or married him.

Click to expand...

Not fun. And to Glenn, you hear a lot of accents here, and candidates generally cope well with them, but one Filipino Master we had could not say "immovable" clearly, it was funny when he was obligating other Filipinos, because they would keep going without missing a beat because they knew what he was saying.

re: What's the toughest job you've had in Freemasonry?

The toughest job I've had in Freemasonry are keeping my head and heart above water when the tsunamis of Bogus Specifics come rolling by.

I was the prosecutor in a Masonic trial.

Companion Joe said:

I was conferring an EA once, and the candidate was deaf as a post.

Click to expand...

One of the lessons I learned was to learn of physical disabilities and take them into account during the planning for a degree. The example was if a candidate was deaf in his right ear take that into account and speak/whisper into his left ear. Extending this to deaf in both ears leads me to think in terms of sign language and that has other repercussions on how a candidate gets prepared.

The guy wasn't stone deaf and used sign language or anything. He was just an older guy who had worked around machinery his whole life.
As for planning, we do enough work that our "planning" consists of the SW getting up a degree cast 30 minutes before it starts. "You want to confer this one tonight?" "Is it my turn? OK; that's fine. Whatever you want me to do." I do remember the fellow who sponsored him saying - after I had already sent the stewards out - "He's a little hard of hearing, so you'll have to speak up." When the guy went back to the preparation room after the first section, the first thing I did was look at his buddy and say, "A little hard of hearing?"

Reading about this initiation reminds me of another. I was acting as deacon in a quad first and my candidate fainted. The cool thing was, as deacon and being charged with his welfare, i caught him AND kept hold of my wand. I'm still proud of that 7 or 8 years on. It was a stuffy room so we opened the door to let some air in while he came too. We got him some water and proceeded. I ended up his mentor, he would have been one of the first guys i mentored. He's given me a couple of great stories, probably better than that one

Presiding over a funeral

KSigMason said:

Presiding over a funeral

Click to expand...

As I said in my OP, something i've always been able to delegate, too hard for me. Thank goodness I've always had someone to push it off to..

My Mentor presided over nearly every funeral I attended. I always admired his strength, performing that function time and again.

Presiding over my fathers Masonic Funeral.

I've attended Masonic funerals of friends but they had a hundred or even several hundred in attendance. It's tough losing a friend but Masonry prepares us for that and being among a crowd of friends lessens the pain.

The toughest funeral I've been to was also the smallest. Three of us conferring the funeral ritual. The dead Brother from out of town who none of us had ever met. His widow staring at us in amazement that we would do this for them simply because he was a fellow Mason. No one else there.

In death we're never alone. Sometimes we're not alone thanks to a tiny number. Sometimes we're not alone thanks to a large crowd.

As to conferring degrees once I had a candidate nearly pass out during his second degree obligation. He shook; I steadied him He teetered; I held him up and whispered an offer to carry him out. He insisted on completing the obligation. Then two of us helped him to his feet and let him think he was walking out of the room under his own steam. A month later, in better health, he attended the lectures to complete his degree. Whew. An event a decade ago that I can still see and feel like it happened yesterday.