In England & Wales Freemasonry has a three tier organisation the
foundations of which rest on the individual Mason.
Masons meet together in Lodges, normally consisting of
between 20 and 50 members although some are much larger.
Lodges themselves are grouped together geographically
into Provincial Grand lodges, the provincial groupings
corresponding roughly to the county boundaries as they
existed in the late 18th or early 19th century. Finally,
the provinces come together under the auspices of Grand
Lodge.
A group of Masons meeting together is called a Lodge.
This name is supposed to originate from the time when
operative stonemasons lived on-site at large building
projects, when their accommodation was known as a lodge.
Lodges are the basic "unit" of Masonry and
generally meet once a month over the October to April
period. The lodge is presided over by a Master, assisted
by his Wardens and officers - in effect the committee who
schedule the work. For more information see the page
which describes the
layout of the Lodge
A Lodge meeting is much like a meeting of any other association, in that it considers
the formal business, such as the minutes of the
previous meeting, dealing with propositions for
membership, the accounts of general and charitable funds,
subscriptions, donations, etc. However, it is within the
Lodge that the ceremonies of admitting new Masons and
teaching them Freemasonry's moral message takes place.
Contrary to popular belief, these ceremonies are not
secret, anyone who is interested can pick up one of many
books describing them at their local library. But reading
the ceremonies does not give the full picture, it is only
by experiencing them that their full value can be
derived.
The room in which a Lodge meets is called a Temple. This
is in not intended to imply that a lodge meeting is in
any way a religious gathering, it is not. (See " Freemasonry and religion
.") Rather, the name
reflects the symbolic association which Masonry makes
with the building of King Solomon's Temple in Jerusalem.
In practice Lodges meet either in buildings specially
constructed for the purpose or in rooms rented or set
aside in pubs or clubs.
These are Lodges in the same form as ordinary lodges in that they have precisely the same officers and meet in the same way. However, they act as the umbrella group coordinating the efforts of individual lodges at, broadly speaking, county level in order to provide for charitable institutions over a wider area.
Again, Grand Lodge is the umbrella for the Provincial Grand Lodges, coordinating at a national level.