CO-FREEMASONRY
Co-Freemasonry was founded as a result of the work of Maria Deraismes.
In 1866, an organisation to defend women’s rights was created in France. One of the founders was the writer Maria Deraismes. At a time when feminist organisations were being established, some Masonic Lodges expressed a desire to grant women the rights that had been given to men, including the right of Masonic Initiation. On 14 January 1882, Maria Deraismes was deemed worthy of wearing the Masonic Girdle, and was initiated into a lodge in Le Pecq called “Les Libres Penseurs”.
This was contrary to the institutions of international Freemasonry, however, and led the Grande Loge Symbolique Écossaise (Scottish Symbolic Grand Lodge) to expel “Les Libres Penseurs” and annul the admission as illegal.
This did not prevent the novitiate from considering herself a Mason, though; so much so, that she did not hesitate to transfer the Masonic Light to other women.
Meanwhile, Georges Martin, a doctor and city councillor in Paris who had been initiated into Freemasonry in 1879, was among the founders of “La Grande Loge Symbolique Ecossaise”, and one of those who proposed that women should be admitted into Freemasonry.
On 4 April 1893, the unstinting and systematic efforts of Maria Deraismes and Georges Martin led them to found the Grand Symbolic Lodge of France, “Le Droit Humain” (The Human Right). Co-Freemasonry was attacked ferociously by its many critics, although a large number of brethren recognised the value of the project. Those who objected interpreted and applied the 1784 Constitutions to the letter, faithful to the prohibitions of the governing bodies.
The new Order also encountered almost insurmountable practical problems.
Understandably, it could not seek a home in official Masonic premises, but nor could it accept just any space for the establishment of the Lodge, which moved all over Paris a number of times, until Georges Martin found appropriate accommodation in Rue Cardinal Lemoine.
Co-Freemasonry spread and maintained the principles that inspired its founders, making a reality of Maria Deraismes’ prophetic prediction on the day of her initiation: “Co-Freemasonry will become a school for the shaping of consciousness, character and will, a school demonstrating that solidarity is not an empty word, an imaginary theory, but is a reality, a natural and immutable law according to which every person has the same interest in doing his duty and exercising his rights.”