Templar Edification

There’s something inherently ethereal, and indeed a bit eerie, about liminal places. Areas of transition—from light to dark, from east to west, from civilization to wilderness—have fascinated every human culture. America is no exception, given our national obsession with “the frontier,” wherever that happens to be in a given generation. Crossroads and doorways, graveyards and twilight, all thrill us with their ambiguity, their in-betweenness. Unseen things, things just beyond the veil, seem that much closer, that much realer. And October is basically one big liminal space. Autumn proves perhaps the most dramatic of the seasons, replete with pungent aromas: spices and woodsmoke and decaying vegetation. Leaves erupt in one last great riot of color before they wither and fall. In comes the harvest, transitioning from summer’s plenty into winter’s scarcity. The winds shift, heralding the frost and ice that, while not yet arrived, are now well and truly on their way. The days grow shorter; ...

We learn in Order of the Temple that it is largely up to Commandery to recognize and celebrate the accomplishments of ALL of our Savior’s Apostles with equal weight upon the table.  Granted, one taper flickered by an act of evil, but it was later rekindled and the 12 were restored.  That’s a separate story from this one. All twelve Apostles and remembrance of them may too rekindle our appreciation for the religious infrastructure they constructed for us long term.  Especially considering nearly all of them suffered horribly at the ends of their lives, they did not forfeit their pledge to our Savior, rather they gave up their lives by stonings, beheadings, skinnings and crucifixions… where but one, only one of them, passed in God’s natural time due to old age… St. John the Apostle General.  It is not fun remembering the suffering and treachery they experienced, but it is necessary for us to remember and be thankful for them, as much as we are able with ...