The REAL secrets of Freemasonry are, have always been and always will be – secret. Secret in the sense that they cannot be shared. Not because of any promise made, or rule or regulation. They cannot be shared because they are contained within the **process** of becoming a Freemason.

Secrets like opening your eyes and seeing, for the first time, your Brothers who accept you as you are, regardless of your religion, regardless of your political beliefs, regardless of your profession, your economic status, your ethnic heritage or your taste in clothes, entertainment or friends.

Secrets like the feeling of being taken by the hand, as a Brother, and made more welcome than you could imagine, by men who may be strangers in the sense that they are unknown to you, but who will soon be close friends, even if they are still unknown to you.

Secrets like walking in the front door to the Lodge, and having every man in the room personally welcome you, when you have never been there before, or just passing through, and do not expect to ever return.

Secrets like knowing that your efforts helped a crippled child walk, a dyslexic read, an autistic child experience reality, a blind person see, or someone recover from or cope with cancer.

These secrets cannot be read in a book, or overheard in a conversation, or even tortured out of someone. They can only be earned, as all Freemasons have, by believing in a Supreme Being, being of good moral character, filling out the petition, being elected into membership and **experiencing the Degrees of Freemasonry**. These secrets cannot be learned or bought. They must be earned!

Some who seek to learn secrets, any secrets, just for the sake of being privy to something they themselves have not earned, fall into the common trap of assuming the handshakes and passwords are the secrets of Freemasonry. They could not be more wrong. Ask any Mason, he may tell you **about** these secrets, but you still will never know them, really know them, not know "about" them is to become a Freemason.