579St Bryde

The Regular Grand Lodge of Italy  

Recently, Bro. James L. Jack, P.G.M. visited Rome and met with Bro. Nick Emerton – Court, Assistant Grand Master of the Regular Grand Lodge of Italy. An enjoyable few hours was spent visiting a Masonic Temple in Rome and discussing the various aspects of the formation and the present structure of the Regular Grand Lodge in  Italy .

Firstly, it must be appreciated that Freemasonry in Italy is mostly irregular and not recognised by the Grand Lodges of Scotland, England and Ireland . There are thought to be in the region of eighty Grand Lodges in Italy but the Regular Grand Lodge is the only one that is deemed to be Regular having been recognised by the three Grand Lodges of Scotland , England and Ireland .

On 30th. November 2006, Bro. Fabio Venzi, Grand Master of the Regular Grand Lodge of Italy was the guest at the Installation of our Grand Master and proposed the toast to The Grand Lodge of Scotland at the Festival of St. Andrew. He was accompanied by Bro. Nick Emerton - Court who was introduced to the Brethren of Lodge St. Bryde by Bro. James Jack.

Here follows the official history of The Regular Grand Lodge, which is really a tribute to those Italian Brethren who struggle to keep Regular Freemasonry alive in a country where irregular Freemasonry is very much the norm.

1993 was the year in which the Italian social and political system, that the nation had lived and made its own for fifty years and more, collapsed, and even Freemasonry, at that time mainly represented by the Grande Oriente d'Italia, had not remained foreign to that unusual as much as virulent Italian revolution.  

In that moment of particular tension and necessity of new representatives, some authoritative brethren decided to  dissociate from the lodges they belonged to and, joining   together, they established the Regular Grand Lodge of Italy as the "sole, independent, undivided, responsible, autonomous and supreme authority over the whole territory of the Italian Republic for the governing of the degrees of the pure and antient universal Freemasonry". The new Grand Lodge had also identified its motto, which appeared inscribed inside the coat of arms: "iure veritati iuncti". Law and truth together. 

Thus the history of the Regular Grand Lodge of Italy began, under the auspices of this binding statement. A few days after, from the new office in via Flavia no. 72, the reasons of the establishment of the new Regular Grand Lodge of the Antient, Free and Accepted Freemasons of Italy were made public. 

"With the Regular Grand Lodge of Italy, for the first time in our country, begins the pure ancient Freemasonry, with the deep and justified belief that its principles have been definitively and irreparably violated, with the consequence that often the Freemasons have acted on the basis of rules that nothing had to do with Freemasonry, in spite of that moral perfecting that every one has the duty to realise in the depths of his conscience. 

The truth is that when the fundamental principles that inspire practical behaviour degenerate, everything becomes possible. In this way are born the false perspectives, the deviations, the search of something that nothing has to do with Freemasonry. 

Instead, the project of a 'new Freemasonry' does not make reference to a different Masonic doctrine, since everything in Freemasonry has already been written and nothing has to be invented, but this project is to know how to read the book of the authentic ancient Masonic tradition, having clear the sense of the return to the origins and from this constitutional choice come the obligations that morally bind all its members.

 However, for the Regular Grand Lodge of Italy going back to the origins meant be  inspired by that Anglo-Saxon model of Freemasonry that became widespread all over the world from the early eighteenth century".

The courageous choice of the Regular Grand Lodge of Italy also found immediate consents not only among the Freemasonry members but also among the society in which many people, careless about what was observed in the past on the Italian Freemasonry, asked to be admitted to the new Institution in order to share its ideals. 

The new position of the Regular Grand Lodge of Italy was also praised both internationally and at European level, as attested by the incessant and growing stream of "recognitions" of the new Italian Masonic reality. 

The United Grand Lodge of England, on the occasion of the quarterly statement of December 8th 1993 , gave its much-desired recognition, taking it away from the Grande Oriente d'Italia. The decision of the ancient English group was followed, a short time later, also by the National Grand Lodge of France, by the Grand Lodge of Ireland and by the Grand Lodge of Scotland. Then the Grand Lodge of Israel and the Grand Lodge of Turkey sided with the new Italian Regular Grand Lodge. Then it was the time of the Grand Orient of Brazil, of the Grand Lodge of Cameroon, of the Grand Lodge of Burkina Faso, of the Grand Lodge of Benin, of the Grand Lodge of the Ivory Coast , of the Grand Lodge of Senegal, of the Grand Lodge of Togo and of other Grand Lodges. After the first period in which Professor Giuliano Di Bernardo, university professor of Philosophy of Sciences at the University of Trento , had been Grand Master, there followed on the 15th of December 2001 the unanimous vote for the new Grand Master for the new Grand Master of the Regular Lodge of Italy, at the presence of the representatives of many worldwide Grand Lodges. 

The new Grand Master who was elected is Fabio Venzi, a Roman with Tuscan descent, he is a sociologist with interests in the historiographic sphere since he has also held the position of historical editor of series of essays for some publishing houses also in English and German.

The new election has determined a new enthusiasm within the Regular Grand Lodge of Italy, and a new wave of important recognitions from other international Grand Lodges has followed; with these international Grand Lodges the new Grand Master has continued to have relationships always more inspired with the ancient ideals of the traditional Masonic Order.

Bro. James L. Jack, P.G.M . . . . . Dec 2006