Freemasons

[Adulado]

Who are they? Satanists, non-satanists?

[Mycernius]

Hardly satanists. In order to be a mason you must believe in a higher being, mostly identified as the christian god. More mainstream christians will say they are not part of them and will give them labels such as satanists, heretics, unbelievers, the usual BS that christrians like to do to any one who is not of their faith.

Calling them satanists is also an incorrect term and is misused by no end of people. The name satanist merely means a person who does not follow the Judeo-christian god. Judaism, christianity and Islam are all followers of that particular deity. Religions such as Buddhism, Hinduism and Shinto are satanists. Do not confuse the word satan in satanist meaning devil worship. It has nothing to do with it. Even LeVeyan Satanism distance itself from the christian satan.

A wiki article on them for you.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freemasonry

[Berkut]

Who are they? Satanists, non-satanists?

Conspiracy theory is always much much more exciting than reality. Freemason, the world's oldest and largest fraternity (don't think College/University Fraternity) has one common requirement that it's candidates and members express a faith in God , or supreme being. Be it called Jehova, Allah, Buddha, He Who Cannot Be Named, etc. Freemasonry can best be described as "Not a Religion but religious in nature". It is truly one of the few organizations which can claim that it strives to accept anyone of faith regardless of their background, financial position or social standing. While there is alot of conjecture I don't believe anywhere do the Freemasons really even refer to Satan, there are symbolic references to "pagan" gods during the biblical times (like Solomon's offerings to Baal - or something like that) but other than that Satan or any manifestation thereof really doesn't seem to play a significant role. Generally Satanism is apparently distinguished as the worship of the Self rather than of a Diety (God). Sort of a Me first exemplified as a philosophy. It seems that Freemasonry's message of Brotherly Love, Duty to God, your fellow Man and lastly to yourself doesn't fit well in that. I think where Freemasonry gets it bad rap is during the days of the Enlightenment. The idea that man is born free and with inalienable rights didn't sit well with the Church of the time. As it has been quoted Pope Leo XIII thought that the evils of Freemasonry lead to such things as "democracy" , "the Rights of the Individual" among other evils. Search Google for Freemasonry and you will find hundreds of thousands of , well, literally insane ramblings