CHARITY BY BRO JOSHUA BERRY
If I were to ask you to tell me some of the charitable acts you have performed recently you would probably tell me about how you gave money to your church or donated to help the Haitian Relief Effort but you probably won’t tell me of the time you gave a stranger a smile or gave someone directions that was lost. You probably won’t tell me of the time help a stranded motorist on the side of a road when it was raining. Why not? These too are all charity and probably have an impact just as great as sending money to an organization.
Charity is defined as the benevolent goodwill toward or love of humanity so how is it that we as humans have found a way to cheapen such a great thing? Goodwill or love of humanity is all that is mandatory for us, as a fraternity, to be considered charitable in nature. Many seem to think it has to do with acts and measurable instances. We as Masons are taught in the Entered Apprentice Degree that we should have Brotherly Love toward ALL mankind yet we sometimes only include the ones closest to us or the ones we know.
Can you measure charity? To answer this I would ask how you record a smile. How do you know if the last time you opened the door for someone as they enter or leave a restaurant may just cause a person to change their outlook on people in general. Maybe the next time a person needs to change lanes on the freeway and you slow down to allow them to do so it may just cause a reaction of kindness from them you will never find out about. That is the beauty of charity it is an act of kindness. It is an act that isn’t recorded on an IRS form or a charitable report.
Look at how our fraternity is set up according to the United Stated Government. If you look up the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) requirements of a 501(c)(10)* we must do three things. First, we must operate under a Lodge system. Secondly, devote their net earnings exclusively to religious, charitable, scientific, literary, educational, and fraternal purposes. Finally, we cannot provide for the payment of life, sick, accident, or other benefits. By educating our members of the true meaning of charity we far exceed the requirements of being a Domestic Fraternal Society. So next time you hear a member slip and call Freemasonry a Charitable Organization we may want to let him know that we are but just a Fraternal Society that teaches charity to our members by the means of brotherly love, relief, and truth. Without those three tenets no man can be made a Mason.
*501(c)(10) requirements from http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-tege/eotopicf04.pdf page 13.
