of course there are!!

My grandfather was a 32nd degree Mason, and a member of Scottish Rite. He joined his Blue Lodge while in the Philippines in the 1930s - he said it kept him on the "straight and narrow" and "out of the bars." When he died in 1991, he was buried in his apron and had the Masonic funeral rites at graveside.

In his honor, I joined the Order of the Eastern Star last year. It is my privilege to sit as Adah this year.

My grandmother never joined OES - she said it was full of little old ladies (of which she was certainly not one :p). That said, I do bring the average in my chapter down to about 60...
:D

You grandfather is surely smiling down on you, sweetheart. Welcome to the family! *hugs*

My grandfather and my uncle were Masons. My grandmother and step mother were Eastern Stars. My dad is a 32nd Degree Scottish Rite Mason. He has been a Mason for sixty years.

He asked me recently if I would like to become a Mason. I have nothing against the Masons, but one fraternal order is enough for me.

Upon graduation I plan to, I come from a long line of masons.

You bring the age down???? i am 38 and they are all over the age of 75 in my chapter :) hehehe

Definitely welcome to the family!!!!!!:) i love to find other masonic relationships on here as we as sharing our fraternity / sorority affliations too.

My dad is a past master belonging to york and scottish rite and commandry for well over 40 yrs.

I am very proud to come from a long line of Masons, shriners, eastern stars, amaranth, and daughters of the nile....as well as my masonic youth roots ( demolay, jobs daughters and rainbow)

It is funny someone asked me do you live at the lodge....some days i feel like it....I should have my mail forwarded there LOL:)

I think interest in the masons is slowly dieing, my father is a mason but i have no real interest... the reason religion looks down on the masons is because they hide certain things from the public through rituals and what-not... officially religion also generally looks down on fraternities for the same reason... my dad was a pastor for around 35 years and has a masters in biblical theology and when he retired the first thing he did was become a mason... i was sponsored by the mason to go to all state band camp and i got to take part in some of their meetings and they just don't seem to have anything to offer other than connections which is great but its not offering enough for me to really look into it...

woops sorry forgot to quote this =D my bad...

a little Masonic history lesson
 

Alas, Freemasonry also gets a bad rep not just for being elitist, but also racist. In the beginning of Masonry as we know it here in the United States, African Americans were forbidden to join lodges, and not just because most were slaves or former slaves (because one requirement for an applicant to become a Mason is having to have been "free-born"). All that changed when a man named Prince Hall and 14 other black men became Masons through a British Masonic military lodge stationed in Boston in 1775.

The next year these men petitoned the UGLE (United Grand Lodge of England) for a charter so the could become their own lodge. In 1784 their request was granted and Prince Hall Freemasonry was born. In 1827 Prince Hall Masons declared independence from the UGLE just as the Most Worshipful Massachusetts Grand Lodge A.F.&A.M did 45 years earlier.A problem quickly arose for black men wishing to become Masons in the newly formed United States: the members of a Lodge must agree unanimously in an anonymous vote to accept a petitioner to receive the degrees. As a consequence of the unanimity requirement, if just one member of a lodge did not want black men in his Lodge, his vote was enough to cause the petitioner's rejection. Thus, although exceptions did exist, Masonic Lodges and Grand Lodges in the United States generally excluded African Americans. And since the vote is conducted anonymously, this created a second problem: since no one knew who had voted against the applicant, it was impossible to identify a member as pursuing a policy of racism. This allowed even a tiny number of prejudiced members to effectively deny membership to black petitioners, and in some cases even exclude black men who had legitimately been made Masons in integrated jurisdictions. Thus there arose a system of racial segregation in American Masonry, which remained in place until the 1960s and which persists in some jurisdictions even to this day.

Today, predominantly black Prince Hall Grand Lodges exist in the United States, Canada, the Caribbean and Liberia, governing Prince Hall Lodges throughout the world. After nearly two centuries of controversy, the Grand Lodge of England was asked to decide the matter of Prince Hall Masonic legitimacy. Carefully studying the records, the Grand Lodge of England concluded that the Prince Hall Grand Lodge of Massachusetts was indeed entitled to Masonic recognition, and this against the tradition that, per state, only one recognized Masonic body should exist. As a result, most (though not all) "mainstream" (i.e. predominantly white) Grand Lodges in the United States and elsewhere have extended full fraternal recognition to their Prince Hall counterparts.

I am a PROUD Prince Hall Freemason and I embrace both A F & A M, and Prince Hall Freemasons as my Brothers. :)

I am a member of both rainbow and eastern star they both have found a true place in my heart and cannot imagine what i would do with myself without them. as to the churches not approving one church my family and i attended told us we either had to quit any masonic affiliated organization or we were not welcomed back. lets just say we never went back to that church.
Rainbow Grand Offices:
Grand Page to Grand Love
Grand Page to the State Dad
Grand Representative to Mississippi and Montana
Grand Representative to Texas and California
Grand Nature
Grand Hope
Grand Drill Leader
have been worthy advisor 3 times (so far)
I am also a member of Eastern Star serving as Adah this year and my dad is currently serving as our worthy patron.
Every male member of my family is a mason and every female member of my family was in rainbow and eastern star.
My mom served as Grand Editor for Rainbow and my dad was the west district governor for Demolay.

Bumping this thread up. :)

I'm a 32 degree Scottish RIte Mason, just got my orders in the Commandery of Knights Templar, hold a chair in the other two main York Rite Bodies, member of the Shrine and am active in my Blue Lodge where I hold a chair as well.

Wow, Vito! That is good work. I'm now in my third term as Worthy Matron in Eastern Star, and will be again in 4 years. I belong to two chapters.

I also have a petition into the local OES and have told the people who matter that I will be willing to be tapped to serve on a DeMolay advising council if it gets restarted here. Unfortunately, only my blue lodge and Shrine are active. Well that and the Scottish rite is hard for me to get to.

I just wanted to mention that my fiance is a Mason and he loves it. He and I will be attending a Thanksgiving event at the lodge and the other Masons are so incredibly sweet and respectful.

I found out after my dad passed that he was a Mason but wasn't active. I still have his ring. I previously dated a Mason and was extended an opportunity to join OES but chose not to plus he and I broke up. Meh, I'm happy with my sorority affiliation. The only other orgs I would join would be photography related (APA, ASMP, etc) first and then social civic groups. I don't have time anyway so there ya go. :)

Interesting. I thought you would have had to marry him first, if you were invited to join OES because of him? I understand that, if you are female, you must be related to a Mason to join OES, and OES has a very broad definition of what "being related to a Mason" means, but I don't think it extends to girlfriends and fiancées.

That said, you'd be eligible to join OES if your father was in good standing at the time of his passing.

My husband has not found a local lodge to affiliate with, but he still pays dues to his home lodge, so I'm eligible to join OES - but I haven't had the time to look into it.

What I find interesting and want to find out more about is the PHA Masonic family. I was fascinated when I found out there were PHA versions of most Masonic organizations.

We were engaged. The idea was to join after we got hitched. As far as my dad, from what I know, he was in good standing. I have a cousin who is an OES but it's not something I want join.

So I showed up at elections yesterday to protect myself and ended up being elected Commander (President) for the Templars and Scribe (2nd VP) for the Royal Arch. Not sure how that happened. *scratches head*

Congratulations? :D

lol. Meh. They are both dying bodies, so not like I can screw things up too badly. OTOH, we decided yesterday to start a big recruiting drive, so if things work out well I might be able to say that I restored a commandery that could actually perform work. Doubtful, but I can get us started there. In all my copious free time of course :D.

T all depends on the OES chapter. I know that some do accept girlfriends of Master Masons, though.

Is that PHA OES or mainstream, because I have never heard of a chapter that would accept a nonrelative unless they were a Jobie or Rainbow.