BONFIRES OF THE VANITIES

Historians called it Bonfire of the Vanities. In the 15th century the Medici had already demonstrated a liberality that at the time was unnerving for Christian extremists, was taken to accounts by an outspoken dominican monk. This is a story of brief notoriety that played on public sentiment.  The growth of Florence was unprecidented. Tight rules of conduct and dissention were relaxed under the administration of a powerful family that controlled church and state.  It was fertile ground for the odd and unavoidable zealot.  Girolama Savonalrola was one who knew how to emflame his congregants. So he aimed his energies at ridding Florence sin by destroying symbols. So his followers dressed in white gowns and garlands went door-to-door collecting sinful objects- artwork, books, cosmetics, dresses etc and burned everything on 7 February 1497.  What connects this with masonry?  But if we had a masonic bonfire for all symbols of vanity, what would be left? Would we still have purpose?  Today, symbols distributed have been distributed in high volume, for very little brotherly input. Compared to the priniciples encapsulating in early masonry, we have a contemporary fascination with them as long as we are not required to adjust behaviour or thinking. I suggest, we are similar, them and us- aligning ourselves intellectually with value based concepts. One additional burden is maintaining messaging that deteriorates when the crowd is so large, intimacy is lost. The aggression between men is about the same. Whether we can have intelligent conversation without distracted by division has tracked us throughout history.  Accountability and connection has expanded so we expect a further 'cleansing'? Our order exists around the world. Today we have choices to make. Will we find best practices for a lodge and adapt without waiting for an entire generation to fade can we do this in real time ?