C. Fred Kleinknecht, 33°
Sovereign Grand Commander

It is essential to sustain and nurture, as Masonry does, the moral center of the individual and his society.

....In times past, no words held such despair for a military commander as these: “The center cannot hold.” In the clash of arms, one flank, or even both, might fall, and victory could still be grasped. But if the center could not hold against the attacking army, the day was lost. As we enter the new millennium, the nature of warfare has changed. Opposing armies no longer march toward each other, attempting to outflank or to attack from the rear. Masses of men no longer move in serried ranks into combat.
....And yet, even more perhaps than in the last century, it is essential that the center hold. There is a center in society, just as there is a center in a battle line, and there is also a center in each individual. If the center in a society or in an individual is lost, then, again, catastrophe follows.
....This societal and individual center consists of shared values and ideals. We have only to look around us to see the results when these values weaken. If the moral and ethical center of society and the individual had held, there would be no terrorist bombings, no street gangs, no children hungry or abandoned, no ethnic groups crying unheard for justice, no demagogues firmly in power. We need only consult the daily newspaper or watch television news to see abundant proof that the center is failing. And if reinforcements do not arrive quickly, the center and then the battle will be lost.
....The theme of the 44th Conference of European Sovereign Grand Commanders is “The Mission of the AASR in the dynamic environment of the future.” As this theme suggests, the future is dynamic. It is often difficult for us truly to grasp the rate of change. If a single page represented the sum total of human knowledge in the 10,000 years before 1900, the accumulation of knowledge between 1900 and 2000 would be equal to the telephone book of a large city. There can be no doubt that our center --- our ethical values and moral sense --- has not kept pace with technical knowledge. This, then, is the mission of the Scottish Rite in the dynamic environment of the future: we must hold the center.
....Our Order is uniquely positioned to accomplish this mission. While the great human truths do not change from age to age and from nation to nation, the expression of those truths does change. Thus the Scottish Rite, with the independence and sovereignty of each Supreme Council, is able to teach these great truths in the ways most effective to the culture of its jurisdiction. Accountable not to each other but only to the great traditions and tenets of Freemasonry, Supreme Councils can and must lead the battle to strengthen mankind’s moral and ethical center.
....It is important to realize that these are not mere words. People make decisions every day based on their values. Each day, every one of us decides to be tolerant or fanatical, compassionate or cold, greedy or sharing, supportive or destructive, curious or ignorant, thoughtful or thoughtless, loving or distant. In an individual, the sum total of those daily decisions is his character; in a nation, it is its culture. The Scottish Rite affects these decisions and points to the right ones. That is our task. That is our mission.
....Our charities are of great importance and of benefit to many, but they are secondary to what we teach. For by those teachings, we strengthen the center, we give men a vision of the possible, we assure them they are not alone in their struggle to lead a values-based and productive life.
....Thus, this is the challenge and the glory of the Scottish Rite in the dynamic environment of the future. We are the teachers and preservers of those personal and societal values to which men must, in time, return if they are to survive. We must bring order from chaos. We must hold the center.