Interactive Leadership

by Midnight Freemason Guest Contributor

WB. Ken Baril

Identifying and developing successful candidates for line positions within the lodge is one of the greatest challenges confronting our fraternity today. Furthermore, given the breadth of interest in the continuing goal of achieving, more pressure is being placed on Masters to identify capable Brothers, and to accelerate their development to fulfill these positions with greater responsibilities and leadership.

A Masters challenge is to ensure the capable brothers are identified and receive aggressive Masonic training in leadership skills, responsive monitoring in role attainment, and initial guidance for role performance. This is apparent. Masters will need assistance in order to add this challenge to their list of top priorities.

An organization is a relatively permanent interaction system to coordinate the placement and development of the membership from the common good of task accomplishment. To the extent that Masters assume responsibility in getting new officers to thoroughly understand their role and its relationship to organizational goals, the officers will internalize the need for role competency, task accomplishment and personal commitment.

Masters and their officers need not to be in conflict, but rather on a continuing path for growth. Our fraternity has purposes, aspirations and values. These dictate the manner in which individual capacities are developed and used for task accomplishment. Some newly appointed officers will need to develop their strengths, others to learn to use unused talents, yet others will need to acquire new approaches. In contrast to a conflict model, the values associated with changes such as these will dictate that Masters be directed toward using experiential-learning tools in exploring the capacities and expectations of Brothers being considered for line positions.

Whether the emphasis is on the tasks associated with getting things done, or on human relationships associated with interpersonal growth, the process of interactive leadership must reflect task and personal growth as simultaneous attributes of leadership excellence. This is imperative if we are to influence effectively our Brothers opportunity to grow and to develop, and just as important, use the rich resources and talents within our fraternity.

~KB

WB Ken Baril was born in New Haven, CT. and moved to the Cincinnati area in 1999. He is a three time Master of his lodge, Temple Lodge No. 16. AF & AM, 1982-1983-1995, located in Cheshire, CT. While living in Connecticut and prior to his moving to Cincinnati, Ohio, Ken has been the featured speaker at many public schools and Veterans organizations. Ken is a published author who has written a book focusing on members of the Masonic Fraternity who have been recipients of our nation’s highest award for bravery, the prestigious Medal of Honor called " The Medal of Honor - The Letter G in Valor". Ken has dedicated his time and effort to researching and developing various programs including, “The Medal of Honor Program,” “The Immortal Four Chaplains,” as well as many others. His programs are dedicated to the preservation of an important portion of American history, contributions, and sacrifices, in the defense of the United States, and to the memory of all those who have given their lives in the pursuit of that objective. He also writes articles for various Masonic publications. He served his country during the Korean War in the United States Air Force. He currently resides in Hudson, FL. with his wife, Marion.

Making Good Men Better

by Midnight Freemason Guest Contributor

WB. Ken Baril

Making good men better is to extract the essence of the Masonic experience. The ritual and ceremony serve to convey and teach certain moral lessons and elevate the individuals to a position higher than themselves. The lessons are things you have likely already heard or have learned in a moral society. What makes them unique to Freemasonry is that they are presented in a specific format and context. We have come to realize, during the time we have been members of this grand fraternity that we have met men we would have never met otherwise. We had the opportunity to get to know these men, not by their looks or touch, but by their hearts, minds, and souls. If we would have passed any of these men on the street before we became Masons, the chances are we would not have noticed them.

We have met numerous men who have truly touched our hearts in many ways. We have learned through their example to be more compassionate, more understanding, more forgiving, more sincere, and above all, more loving. Not one of these men has an uncharitable disposition; therefore, they are all true Masons.

Masonry strives to teach its members that it would be great if we could convey this message throughout the whole world in ways we would have never thought possible.

We look to build on the positive example of others and bring those virtues, which are beneficial to them and to ourselves. No man is perfect, and we are taught that the lodge is a moral workshop in which the rough ashlar is to be polished for use and beauty. If our lodges had been too exacting, none of us would have gained admission.

As Masons, we should treat those brothers who have unfavorable and irritable traits, not with bitterness, nor with good-natured easiness, not with worldly indifference, nor with philosophic coldness, but with pity, patience, and loving kindness. At our Altar of Obligation, we learn to look for the best in men, find their strong points, and cast aside the negative and unfavorable traits. We are taught that we should attempt to see the best in our Brethren, to cast the best light on their actions, to see them and to hear their words in the most positive light, in the most CHARITABLE light. We are also taught to have a benevolent goodwill toward, or love, for humanity and be lenient in our judgment of others. This most benevolent Brotherhood has men of good character.

We meet brothers who may be ignorant, weak, or even ugly of spirit, driven by some blind force as all of us are apt to be and if so, our tact, and brotherly love and charity may be tested and tried, but more often than not, we can bring them back to intelligence, strength, and beauty. As the Bible states, “Judge not, lest ye be judged.” Truly, this is a wise saying, no less true today than when first said. As the old Greek said, “Know thyself,” because if we do not know ourselves, we cannot know others. It behooves us to put ourselves under the spell of all the influences God is using for the making of man, among which the spirit of Masonry is one of the gentlest, wisest and most benign.

If our erring brothers must be censored or expelled, they must also be treated with compassion. The Supreme Architect of the Universe waits to welcome them back with joy. They have done themselves a far deeper injury than they have anyone else. With empathy, prayer, and pain, let our hearts beat in harmony with all the powers the Supreme Architect of the Universe is using for their recovery.

“There remain Faith, Hope, and Charity; but the greatest of these, is Charity.”

As Master Masons, we have learned the Five Points of Fellowship, and these lessons should be foremost in our minds. This is how we, as Masons, “Make Good Men Better!”

~KB

WB Ken Baril was born in New Haven, CT. and moved to the Cincinnati area in 1999. He is a three time Master of his lodge, Temple Lodge No. 16. AF & AM, 1982-1983-1995, located in Cheshire, CT. While living in Connecticut and prior to his moving to Cincinnati, Ohio, Ken has been the featured speaker at many public schools and Veterans organizations. Ken is a published author who has written a book focusing on members of the Masonic Fraternity who have been recipients of our nation’s highest award for bravery, the prestigious Medal of Honor called " The Medal of Honor - The Letter G in Valor". Ken has dedicated his time and effort to researching and developing various programs including, “The Medal of Honor Program,” “The Immortal Four Chaplains,” as well as many others. His programs are dedicated to the preservation of an important portion of American history, contributions, and sacrifices, in the defense of the United States, and to the memory of all those who have given their lives in the pursuit of that objective. He also writes articles for various Masonic publications. He served his country during the Korean War in the United States Air Force. He currently resides in Hudson, FL. with his wife, Marion.

Something to Think About

by Midnight Freemason Guest Contributor

WB Ken Baril

Today, our cherished order faces a critical junction in our glorious history. Simply put, our fraternity faces the frightening prospect of declining membership and a general apathy among many of its members.

It will be necessary for all of us in the Masonic order throughout the United States to do some serious soul searching and thinking to prevent this sad prospect from continuing into the future.

Every organization and every type of organization in this nation face the same dual problems, apathy among its present members and the inability to draw in and retain new ones. This epidemic starts with child and youth activities, religious groups, civic organizations, veteran groups, and others. No further proof of such decline is needed than to speak with some hard working Cub Scout leader, CYO worker or a Commander of a veteran post, to see that this malaise is nationwide.

What the Masonic fraternity should consider doing would involve a widespread plan to attempt to re-establish the moral values upon which this great nation was founded and prospered so well. The Masonic fraternity is facing a morally and ethically corrupt society, a society that will not and cannot respond to traditional approaches, because it simply no longer feels the Masonic fraternity (or any other organization today) is a part of its' “moral character.” In short, Freemasonry must attempt in its own way and fashioned after Masonic concepts, to help in the re-birth of those values that have been lost. A nation that loses its values has relinquished its heritage, and will surely forfeit the future. This is where the crux of the matter lies. We are faced on all sides with a decline in personal honesty and integrity, with religious, business, government and educational corruption and moral bankruptcy on the part of the American people. Our society is torn with problems involving alcohol and drug abuse, violent crimes and depravity, sexual promiscuity and more degradation to an extent many of us could not have imagined just a few short years ago. All we have to do is turn on our television or log onto our computer and the immoral world around us comes flooding into our homes. We see a generation growing up being bombarded with images of immorality and inhumanity that make the sins described in Dante’s Inferno pale by comparison. It seems as if we have lost our moral fiber and character. Who of us, in our wildest dreams, would ever think that the time would come when mothers giving their four-year old child marijuana to smoke is some sort of "normal"?

In responding in our own way to such problems, in attempting to help re-establish the values we cherish, should be the Masonic mission of the next quarter century. The task ahead, if such is pursued, will entail hard work and complex planning, but any attempt at less is a band-aid approach to the problems we now face. We all like to think that our Masonic philosophy is a bulwark of morality, a way to live with our fellow man, be he Mason or not, in peace, harmony and brotherly love. How better to reflect such a philosophy than to engage in a noble enterprise such as this? Our fraternity would not face such a drastic decline as we experience today if society reflected those values it held so long ago.

The answer lies in a collective attempt to restore cherished values across this land. What more glorious mission could the Masonic order engage upon now? Time is running out and we have within our grasp an opportunity to help in the restoration of traditional American values. If such an attempt is made and fails, we may still take pride in the attempt, but if such an effort results in other groups and individuals taking up the challenge, wonderful!

This is the path to Masonic survival, and probably too, the survival of the values and country we all love.~SKB 

WB Ken Baril was born in New Haven, CT. and moved to the Cincinnati area in 1999. He is a three time Master of his lodge, Temple Lodge No. 16. AF & AM, 1982-1983-1995, located in Cheshire, CT. While living in Connecticut and prior to his moving to Cincinnati, Ohio, Ken has been the featured speaker at many public schools and Veterans organizations. Ken is a published author who has written a book focusing on members of the Masonic Fraternity who have been recipients of our nation’s highest award for bravery, the prestigious Medal of Honor called "The Medal of Honor - The Letter G in Valor". Ken has dedicated his time and effort to researching and developing various programs including, “The Medal of Honor Program,” “The Immortal Four Chaplains,” as well as many others. His programs are dedicated to the preservation of an important portion of American history, contributions, and sacrifices, in the defense of the United States, and to the memory of all those who have given their lives in the pursuit of that objective. He also writes articles for various Masonic publications. He served his country during the Korean War in the United States Air Force. He currently resides in Hudson, FL. with his wife, Marion.

Alas, My Brother

by Midnight Freemason Guest Contributor

WB Ken Baril

Last evening, about six-thirty,

I went to a visitation

For a departed Brother of a Masonic Lodge

Without any hesitation.

I slowly entered the funeral home,

Rather solemnly, I confess.

I thought I would be greeted by many

Of his Masonic Brothers, no less.

Only three of his Lodge Brother’s were present,

While the family sat alone.

Where is all the Brotherly Love

His Brothers should have shown?

Not only was I embarrassed,

For I could feel the family’s pain,

Of not seeing their loved ones Brothers,

As the mourners went and came.

The Masonic oaths we took on bended knee,

Should mean much more than this.

Have we lost sight of what they mean?

My Brothers, something surely is amiss.

We certainly have an obligation,

To make time to say Good-bye:

 Eternity is a long, long, time

For tear filled eyes to dry.

Although many of your Brothers are not here,

To say their last farewell,

I am here to say my last Good-bye,

Alas, my Brother, sleep well!

~KB

WB Ken Baril was born in New Haven, CT. and moved to the Cincinnati area in 1999. He is a three time Master of his lodge, Temple Lodge No. 16. AF & AM, 1982-1983-1995, located in Cheshire, CT. While living in Connecticut and prior to his moving to Cincinnati, Ohio, Ken has been the featured speaker at many public schools and Veterans organizations. Ken is a published author who has written a book focusing on members of the Masonic Fraternity who have been recipients of our nation’s highest award for bravery, the prestigious Medal of Honor called " The Medal of Honor - The Letter G in Valor". Ken has dedicated his time and effort to researching and developing various programs including, “The Medal of Honor Program,” “The Immortal Four Chaplains,” as well as many others. His programs are dedicated to the preservation of an important portion of American history, contributions, and sacrifices, in the defense of the United States, and to the memory of all those who have given their lives in the pursuit of that objective. He also writes articles for various Masonic publications. He served his country during the Korean War in the United States Air Force. He currently resides in Hudson, FL. with his wife, Marion.