- Forget Fidel, just give me the secret handshake, senor...
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- Cuba's capital has a sovereign grand commander who wears
a uniform, is privy to secrets and partial to symbolism. But he is not
Fidel Castro. His name is Jesus Armada Pena, and he is a 33rd degree mason
who presides over Cuba's Supreme Council at an imposing, if age-worn, Scottish
Rite Masonic temple in central Havana.
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- Long discouraged and distrusted by the authorities, Cuba's
masons have seen their ranks more than double since the 1980s, to 29,000
members in more than 316 lodges across the island. Earlier this year, the
Cuban Government gave permission for two new lodges, the first since 1967.
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- Along with other fraternal or mystical groups, like the
Oddfellows and the Rosicrucians, the Masons have been attracting men searching
for more enduring answers than those offered by communism, the only system
generations of Cubans have ever known.
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- Once shrouded in secrecy, the fraternal groups - which
exist in many countries and have origins as old as the Crusades - shun
specific religions and ideologies and say their purpose is to foster brotherhood
and search for truth.
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- The Masons, the largest of Cuba's brotherhoods, meet
weekly to celebrate rituals in rooms with flaked murals of the heavens
and tarnished swords on pedestals. They sit, wearing threadbare ceremonial
aprons, in high-backed wooden chairs.
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- First Published 5-1-2
- Copyright © 2002 The Age Company Ltd
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- http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2002/04/30/1019441369020.html
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