Dear Grant et al

That's such an informative reply, thank you - could i repost that in my 
newsletter "Mandrake Speaks"
where i have a comment on the current issues which i'm told is 
reasonably objective?

Mogg

ps: the current issue also has a some notes on the use of the term 
"pagan" -
that may be of interest to
to those on another thread. - To Caroline i'd recommend a book called 
"Moses the Egyptian" by Jan Assmann for some interesting data on the
magical use of "Moses" in Roman Egypt - which is provides a good reason 
why maybe Crowley
shouldn't have substituted "Ankh-Afner-Khonsu" for "Moses" in the 
opening prayer.


 that i'm told is reasonably objective Potts wrote:
> Greetings Mogg,
>
> mandrake wrote:
>> I just wonder - maybe its none of my business - whether there is some 
>> internal mechanism , whereby you can bring your leadship to account - 
>> and if you are able to talk about that?
>
> Although I've heard OTO members put out different interpretations, I 
> myself believe, and have had members of US Grand Lodge confirm, that 
> the only "secrets" within OTO are those directly related to 
> initiations.  So, I consider myself free to talk about anything but 
> the specific contents of initiations, and perhaps specific 
> confidential bits of information I may be privy to that would be a 
> violation of another persons privacy--but the latter is just basic 
> ethics.
>
> So, yeah, I can address your question.  There really is no direct 
> mechanism within OTO for the general membership to hold the leadership 
> accountable.  Ostensibly, they could rally others within the higher 
> grades to take up their cause, but that's pretty much it.  Lacking 
> that, the only recourse a member unhappy with actions not directly 
> related to them has one course--leaving.  In this way, OTO is truly 
> hierarchical, and I wouldn't want to suggest otherwise.  When I made 
> my point earlier I only trying to suggest that it is not monolithic 
> (just as the Catholic church is not really monolithic despite its 
> centralization around the Vatican).  My own observation has been that 
> members within the lower grades who have issues with the leadership's 
> actions usually are able to gain a voice in policy, if at all, through 
> informal channels, as there is no formal channel for doing so.
>
> Now, if a member feels that they have a grievance that relates 
> directly to them, there are formal channels for addressing that 
> through an Ombudsman's office, at least within US Grand Lodge.  So, if 
> you feel directly harmed, you can seek to bring the leadership to 
> account for that through specific formal channels.  But if you simply 
> disagree with the direction, all you can really do is make your 
> disagreement known.
>
> One potential exception, of course, is the office of the 
> revolutionary, whose job it is to depose the current sovereign within 
> a grand lodge.  So, if one is in strong disagreement, one could 
> potentially secretly join the cause of the revolutionary.  There are 
> supposed to be two revolutionaries within any grand lodge.  I think US 
> Grand Lodge is the only lodge that currently has an appointed 
> revolutionary (there is only one, and it is a recent appointment), and 
> the identity of that revolutionary is secret.  Based on my 
> conversations and interviews, I'd say that some members do seem to 
> hold the belief that if they are in strong disagreement with the 
> present leadership, it is not merely their right, but their duty, to 
> try to topple that leadership--either from without or within.  I'd 
> have to go back into my notes and transcripts to really get specifics 
> on this--I don't have time for that kind of detailed work, but this is 
> one of the questions I do hope to address in formal writing in the 
> future.
>
> Let me add, though, that my own knowledge is primarily based on local 
> body participation and observation of actions on the grand lodge level 
> in the United States.  I'm not particularly knowledgeable about the 
> specific workings of the International Leadership or about other grand 
> lodges.  When I set out my project as a researcher, I constrained 
> myself to the specifics of looking at the order on a local body level, 
> and really only concerned myself with even grand lodge issues as they 
> affected the local body.  Of course, I have my own knowledge of those 
> workings because I've been a member for quite some time and because I 
> work as editor of Agape, the US Grand Lodge newsletter.
>
> I hope that helps address your questions.  The institutional mode of 
> management is definitely one of my areas of interest, and I hope to 
> specifically address in my future writing some of how members 
> understand the hierarchical structure of the order to integrate with 
> the seemingly individualist ethos of Thelema.  Again, though, a 
> responsible account of that requires a kind of detailed work I won't 
> be able to do for some months.
>
> Regards,
> Grant
>
>