Progressive office refers to a series of offices within the lodge, culminating in the office of Worshipful Master. Ideally, a mason starts at the most junior office and "progresses" to the next in line each year. However, each office is an elected office and progression is preferred, but not mandated. The exact composition of the progressive officers varies slightly by jurisdiction, but will typically finish with the series: Junior Deacon, Senior Deacon, Junior Warden, Senior Warden, Worshipful Master.
Read more about this topic: Masonic Lodge Officers
Famous quotes containing the words progressive and/or office:
“A radical is one of whom people say “He goes too far.” A conservative, on the other hand, is one who “doesn’t go far enough.” Then there is the reactionary, “one who doesn’t go at all.” All these terms are more or less objectionable, wherefore we have coined the term “progressive.” I should say that a progressive is one who insists upon recognizing new facts as they present themselves—one who adjusts legislation to these new facts.”
—Woodrow Wilson (1856–1924)
“... Washington was not only an important capital. It was a city of fear. Below that glittering and delightful surface there is another story, that of underpaid Government clerks, men and women holding desperately to work that some political pull may at any moment take from them. A city of men in office and clutching that office, and a city of struggle which the country never suspects.”
—Mary Roberts Rinehart (1876–1958)