UNITY

by Bob Ellenwood, MPS

The other day I was eating in a
restaurant where the presiding officers
of the town's four service clubs were
meeting to discuss an important upcom-
ing city project. Present were the
presidents of the Kiwanis club, the
Rotary club, and the Civitan club and
the Worshipful Master of the local
Masonic Lodge.

As they sat chatting over a cup of cof-
fee, the president of the Rotary Club
said to the President of the Kiwanis
Club, "You know, I have always ad-
mired the work you fellows do in this
town and if I were not a Rotarian I
would most certainly be a Kiwanian."

"I feel the same way," said the Kiwa-
nian. "If I were not a Kiwanian, I would
most certainly be a Rotarian."

At that point, the Civitan Club Presi-
dent said to the Worshipful Master, "I
know you're a Mason. But if you weren't
a Mason what would you be?"

"Well," said the Worshipful Master,

'If I were not a Mason, I'd be ashamed
of myself."

Hopefully, this is the way most
Masons feel. We have and should have
much pride in ourselves and our
Lodges.

However, in recent times we have
computerized things to such an extent
that maybe we have become too depen-
dent upon automation and thus have
forgotten how important individuals
are.

A man came home one day from work
absolutely dragging. It was all he could
do to get to the couch and stretch out.

"Did you have a hard day at the of-
fice?" his wife asked.

"Ohl It was terrible," he moaned.
"The computer broke down in the mid-
dle of the morning and we had to do our
own thinking all day long."

It is the Grand Master's earnest desire
to see UNITY established here today.

As we shall see in a few minutes the
definition of UNITY is: continuity
without deviation or change--one-
ness--unification.

UNITY--togetherness--the whole--
the sum of all parts. UNITY is the name
of the committee that has worked on this
meeting for over a year and UNITY is
the name of this meeting for a very spe-
cific reason. Because UNITY is what we
are striving for. UNITY of spirit, UNI-
TY of effort, and UNITY of purpose.

Why UNITY7 Because UNITY, co-
operation and an increase in member-
ship during the next few years in
Masonry are the Grand Master's heart-
felt desire. Hopefully, that is what we
will start here today and it will continue
into the future so that we can see an in-
crease in the membership of all phases
of Masonry and its affiliated bodies.

In one of his most famous speeches
President John F. Kennedy said: "And
so my fellow Americans--ask not what
your country can do for you--ask what
you can do for your country." I para-
phrase that into the saying "Ask not
what Masonry can do for me, rather ask
what can I do for Masonry?"

Now Masonry has done a lot for me
and I am sure each of you can make the
same statement. We all can tell of many
instances of what Masonry has done for
us. But how many stories can we tell of
what we have done for Masonry? What
can we do for Masonry? Hopefully, we
will answer that question here today.

But back to UNITY. It is defined in
the American Heritage Dictionary of
the English Language as:

1). The state of being one; singleness.
2). /The state, quality, or condition of
accord or agreement; concord. 3). /The
combination or arrangement of parts
into a whole; unification. 4). /A combi-
nation or union thus formed. 5). /Sin-
gleness or constancy of purpose or ac-
tion; continutity.

Webster's Ninth New Collegiate Dic-
tionary defines UNITY as:

1). The quality or state of not being
multiple: ONENESS. 2). /A condition
of harmony; ACCORD. 3). /Continuity
without deviation or change. 4). /The
quality or state of being made one:
UNIFICATION. 5). /The totality of re-
lated parts; an entity that is a complex
or systematic whole.

Now contrast the first definitions
given in these separate dictionaries:

The state of being one; SINGLE-
NESS. The state of not being multiple:
ONENESS .

The American Heritage takes a very
positive approach whereas Websters' is
totally negative; yet they both arrive at
the same definition.

Normally I like a positive approach,
however, in this particular instance it
really makes ro difference.

Some synonyms for UNITY are:
Union, (then the term made famous by
the Polish labor unions) Solidarity, and
Homogeneity. These nouns refer to a
condition of oneness in some sense; th~y
damental agreement ot mterdepenaent
and usually varied components, which
in turn produce harmony, as of
thought, purpose, or artistic quality.

UNITY and cooperation--you can't
have one without the other. In fact, I
will go so far as to say that cooperation
is the foundation upon which UNITY
must be built. AsJesus said in Matthew
7 verses 24 through 27:

24 "Therefore whosoever heareth these
sayings of mine, and doeth them, I will
liken unto a wise man, which built his
house upon a rock:"

25 And the rain descended, and the
floods came, and the winds blew, and
beat upon the house; and it fell not; for
it was founded upon a rock.

26. And everyone that heareth these
sayings of mine, and doeth them not,
shall be likened unto a foolish man,
which built his house upon the sand.

27. And the rain descended, and the
floods came, and the winds blew, and
beat upon the house; and it fell: and
great was the fall of it."

lt is very simple; a house built upon a
foundation of sand can not and will not
stand .

UNITY without cooperation is like a
house with a foundation of sand.

Without cooperation you have no
foundation upon which UNITY can be
built.

The Most Worshipful Grand Master
has expressed the desire to see all bodies
of Masonry and all of its affiliates coop-
erate completely during the coming
Grand Lodge years. Brother Ray has
discussed this with the Un~ty committee
on numerous occasions and we have dis-
cussed it amongst ourselves many times.
What will cooperation bring us? First let
us take a look at the word cooperation
and ask what precisely does it mean?
And how would it apply to us?

The American Heritage Dictionary
defines cooperation as: An act of
cooperating. Fine; now what is coopera-
ting? It is defined as: To work together
toward a common end or purpose.

Webster's Ninth New Collegiate Dic-
tionary defines cooperation as:

The action of cooperating: common
effort. I like that--Common Effort.--
Common Effort. It further defines

cooperate as:

1.) To act or work with another or

others: act together. (very good.) 2.) To
associate with another or others for
mutual benefit.

Now let us look at the definition: "To
associate (or work) with another or
others for mutual benefit." (This is, I
believe, what the Grand Master has in
mind . )

Remember I said work with others.

Today; we have come together for the
beginning. Now let us stay together, not
physically but spiritually to work toward
a common goal and pray that we can al-
so work together until we have reached
success. Because; coming together is a
beginning; keeping together is progress;
and working together is success.

Here again that word WORK . Re -
member you cannot climb the ladder of
success with your hands in your pockets.
We must all work.

Also, it is very important that we have
enthusiasm for Masonry; and that we
show others this enthusiasm, make sure
it shows in all we do for Masonry.

Or as can be said to gain UNITY:
AGAIN coming together is a beginning;
keeping together is progress; and work-
ing together is success or UNITY.

Remember the banana; when it left
the bunch it got skinned.

But back to cooperation: As an exam-
ple; for instance how much has a lack of
cooperation cost us as a nation7 Let me
cite a couple of examples:

Because of the way the Department of
Defense and Joint Chiefs of Staff were
set up at the end of World War II, there
was created a weak and ineffectual or-
ganization that existed then as well as
now. Inter-service and intra-service ri-
valry has caused the Armed Forces to
fight over defense budgets, control of
weapons systems, etc. For instance, dur-
ing the late 1950s, rather than establish-
ing a joint effort by the Armed services
to develop missiles; the Army, Navy,
and Air Force each set out, indepen-
dently of one another, to develop their
own missile system and this led, in 1957,
to the USSR, not the USA, to be first to
launch a satellite into outer space.

In early 1956 the Army began a con-
centrated effort to beat the Russians, by
a year, and place a satellite in orbit
around the earth. They could have ac-
complished this by the late summer of
1956. However, theJoint Chiefs of Staff
voted, Air Force and Navy against Ar-
my, along with Defense Secretary
Charles Wilson, to remove the Army's
midrange missile program from the Ar-
my and give it to the Navy. At the same
time General James M. Gavin, Army's
Chief of Research and Development,
was given a written order which read in
part: Quote "The Redstone and Jupiter
missiles will not be used to launch a
satellite." In September of 1956 the Ar-
my successfully fired a Jupiter-C missile
with-sufficient power to launch a satel-
lite; but without a satellite on board.
And again in August 1957; each time
the Army dutifully reported to Secretary
Wilson that there was not a satellite in
the missiles' nose cone. Finally, on Oc-
tober 4, 1957 the Russians launched a
missile. Thus Sputnik was born. Still the
DOD would not let the Army launch a
missile bearing a satellite. Then on No-
vember the 3rd the Russians launched
an even larger satellite.

By this time great political pressure
had been brought to bear on the
Eisenhower administration and the Ar-
my was finally permitted to proceed. On
January 31, 1958 the Redstone missile
was finally used to launch America's
first satellite into outer space, one that
could have been in orbit two years
earlier if only the Armed services had all
been cooperating all along.

This demonstrates rather well the old
adage which says: "Whenever you are
too selfishly looking out for your own in-
terests, you have only one person work-
ing for you--yourself. But when you
help a dozen other people with their
problems, you have a dozen people
working for you." On the other side of
the coin we must show both cooperation
and enthusiasm; for example:

One night the phone rang and my
daughter answered it and after a while,
hung up and went back to her home-
work. "That was a quick call," I said.
"You only talked for 15 minutes. What
was the matter?" "Wrong number," she
said. Now 15 minutes on a wrong num-
ber, that's enthusiasm.

However: the other example of coop-
erative effort within our Government:

On April 24 in 1980, a joint effort to
rescue the Americans being held hos-
tage in Iran was attempted. It involved:
two CIA agents (before the main opera-
tion started, they planted landing lights
in the desert), 93 commandos (to rescue
the hostages from the former American
Embassy), 13 Army rangers (to rescue
the 4 hostages being held separately
from the others), about 12 Army an-
tiaircraft experts, 11 men fiuent in Farsi
(Far-see), the local language (they were
part military, part secret agents, part
civilian, and one Navy Captain [Their
job was to drive the trucks into and out
of Teheran (Ta-ron)], 8 Marine
helicopter air crews (to fly the rescue
force closer to Teheran), an Air Force
Special Operations Control Team (to do
the necessary refueling), 2 Iranian
Generals (who were jwt along for the
ride, friends of some big wheel in D.C.),
the Air Force air crews for 3 C-130 air-
craft and 3 tanker aircraft, and a third
Army ranger force to capture an aban-
doned air field south of Teheran to be
used as a staging area to load the freed
hostages and rescuers aboard aircraft to
fly them out of Iran. The reasons for
this mix, from all the Armed Services
involved, were varied. I . ) The US didn't
have any military organization with a
combination of planes, helicopters, and
other equipment necessary to conduct
long-range antiterrorist operations. 2.)
The Navy would not allow anyone ex-
cept Navy personnel to fly from aircraft
carriers, therefore, only Marine Corps
helicopters could be used, as others were
not available with the necessary range to
accomplish this task.

Also, because of the inter-service and
intra-service rivalry and the committee
system at the apex of the US defense
structure the following things were not
done. A written plan of full operations
did not exist and a full rehearsal of the
operation was not held. Therefore,
when this rescue force arrived and was
down on the desert floor there were four
separate commanders, not wearing any
type of identification marks, using
radios that did not operate on the same
frequencies, and although two of them
could talk to either the White Howe or
the Pentagon, they could not com-
municate with each other and had no
agreed-upon plan of operation. The
rangers could not communicate with
the Air Force, the Marines, or the Navy
and vice versa. There were a lot of other
similar things that caused all of this but
we simply do not have time to go into it

After all of the above, one of the
Marine Corps pilots got so close to a
C-130 that the helicopter rotor knocked
a hole in its fuel tank starting a fire.
Then things got worse. It cawed the
rescue attempt to have to be aborted.
The point being: had there been more
cooperation and trust am ong t he
have been averted. (Would not have
happened.) Cooperation--to associate
with others for mutual benefit.
Redoubling the effort.

Undoubtedly you have all seen the
sign "No one plans to fail; they fail to
plan." When someone fails, is it because
they've lacked enough planning? Or was
it because they didn't give it enough ef-
fort? Is the problem laziness or is it a
lack of planning? Does effort inspire
planning? Does planning inspire effort?
Or do they stimulate and sustain each
other?

Of course, the answer is: they do
stimulate and sustain each other,
especially when effort is defined as "giv-
ing it all you can." There is not a doubt
that little effort is put forth without
some planning. It is also certain that
prior planning motivates maximum
output of personal energy and invest-
ment .

That is why we are here today to try
and get all the Masonic family together
to cooperate fully with one another. Not
that we are going into the desert to try
and rescue hostages but that we need
help; all the help we can get to save our-
selves; to save our Fraternity. The pro-
jections about the future of Masonry are
not good. I don't want to sound like a
doomsayer but the future, currently, is
not bright. However, this assembly can
and must do something about that.
Cooperation is forming a partnership.
In John 15:4 we find "Abide in me, and
I in you. As the branch cannot bear
fruit of itself...neither can you, unless
you abide in Me . " . . . In other words
together we must all work toward a
common goal. To save Masonry as we
know it.

We have already seen steps being
taken in the right direction:

For instance the terms: Shrine
Masons, Scottish Rite Masons, York
Rite Masons, etc., showing the inter-
relationships, is a step in the right direc-
tion. But it is not enough. What hap-
pened when you became a member of a
Masonic organization? You formed a
partnership. Now who will have more
success-- the person who is confident
that he can make it all by himself or the
person who shares the power, the credit,
the risks, and the rewards with a partner
or partners. It will be through the lea-
dership represented here today that Ma-
sonry will either survive or die within the
next few years. Think about that. You
all, us all, are the only hope that our
Brothers and Sisters out there in Okla-
homa Masonry have to save our gloriow
fraternity. Either we do it or it will not
be done.

Remember: If you want to avoid criti-
cism, say nothing, do nothing, be
nothing.

Also, think about Christopher Col
umbus. If Columbus had turned back,
no one would have blamed him. But no
one would have remembered him,
either.

Shall we succeed or shall we fail? The
answer lies within this group gathered
here today.

The man who gets the most satisfac-
tory results is not always the man with
the most brilliant single mind, but
rather the man who can best coordinate
the brains and talents of his associates.
Failure can be divided into those who
thought and never did and those who
did and never thought.

In closing let me elaborate and not
only repeat some of what has been said
about UNITY and cooperation but re-
member up front I mentioned automa-
tion and individuals. Individuals are
where its at. indivdauals are
at least in part, the answer to our
problem.

We as individuals must live our Ma-
sonry in such a manner that other indi-
viduals, male or female, young or old,
will want to be like us. Or will want
their husbands, fathers, sons, brothers,
boy friends, etc., to be like us. We must
live Masonry with enthusiasm. Just re-
member this quote from Ralph Waldo
Emerson: "Nothing great was ever
achieved without enthusiasm." Enthwi-
asm--you mwt show such enthusiasm
for Masonry that even if people throw
cold water on you, you are willing to go
right on living as an enthusiastic Mason.

This enthuiasm must be so conta-
gious that others will go to any length to
learn about Masonry, will want Mason-
ry at whatever cost. You mwt show so
much enthusiasm that they feel com-
pelled to ask you about Masonry; so
compelled they will literally tear your
clothes off to learn about Masonry.

Remember, Brethren, we are the
only Masonry the non-masons of our
society see and they must learn about
Masonry from us. Let us live up to our
Masonic teachings and beliefs.
