The first masonic lodge in Canada was founded in 1738 at Annapolis Royal, N.S. An international fraternal organization, freemasonry was formed from local lodges grouped into large ones and included rites of initiation. It championed the idea that the state was independent of the church, and its members shared political and social concerns such as literacy for the most underprivileged. In Protestant circles, membership in various exclusive organizations such as the masonic order solidified one’s social standing in the upper class of Canadian society, but in the Catholic world, haunted by the spectre of freemasonry, it was viewed as a menace.