Scottish Rite Reunions

The conferral of Scottish Rite degrees, should be when possible, offered in costume and by carefully trained casts. Many of the ceremonies are quite elaborate, requiring a small army of workers. They attract brethren from many miles away creating the “Reunion.” Some of the obligatory degrees are so complex that the ceremonies are put on only once or twice a year giving greater import to the Reunion.

Not all Scottish Rite Bodies put on all the degrees in any one Reunion Staged and enacted degrees that are omitted are presented by a single orator or a team of instructors referred to as communicated degrees. All degrees of the Rite are required for a Master Mason to become a Scottish Rite Freemason.

It is impossible, of course, to describe the degrees of the Scottish Rite. The Northern and Southern Jurisdictions differ, however so slightly, with the latter being chiefly the work of Albert Pike’s revision of the older rituals inherited from the European Lodges. In the Northern Jurisdiction, the Mother Council’s ritual form is followed while the ceremonies are entirely different.

Elective and appointed officers in each of the bodies ay take part in the degrees, but do not necessarily do so, deferring to the more experienced participants. The degree ceremonies are difficult and intricate; their scenic investiture large. They offer great opportunities for workers who have talents and ability. Thus the teams stay together for long periods of time all the while perfecting their character roles that they might become the elite of the degree casts. It is important to note that the casts perform the degree in front of the Reunion Class rather than working it upon them.

The fourth to the thirty-second degrees of the Scottish Rite, beautiful and inspiring as they are, should not be, as they often are, called “Higher Degrees” denoting an elevation, a superiority, over the first three degrees of the Symbolic or Blue Lodge. The greatest authorities in the Scottish Rite are emphatic in the statement that neither of the Rites, Scottish or York, can make of a man more than he becomes in the Blue Lodge. What is offered is the opportunity to become a better Mason: “It may be too late to change a common terminology, but, however we may refer to these ancillary or appendant degrees, let us not make the mistake of pretending that a thirty-third degree Mason is “Higher” than a Master Mason, much less the Master of a Lodge. Let us by our conduct and our speech always acknowledge the Grand Master of Masons in his own Jurisdiction to be the highest officer the world has ever known or ever can know.