they claim to be a spiritual, ethical and very virtuous collection of upright men. You must believe in a supreme being (whatever that is, is open to interpretation. You must swear an oath to never reveal whatever the secrets are. Im not aware of any religion condemning them, other than the Catholic Church. Imo that makes them anti church, which is first estate of old world order, the ethical power (I know, I know, morally suspect themselves at various points in history) over the secular power of kings and governments. Which might be the reason they are seen as New world order. Iverting the power structures to create a bottom up power grid. But the reality is what you described. A self serving political entity which always ends up more corrupt than the world order they plan to invert.
the lower levels of freemasons blue lodges appear quite ordinary clubs, red lodges of York right degree 4 -7 also seem reasonably ordinary, but its the power echelons that allegedly get quite bizarre. I read that (no idea if its anti masonic propaganda) but ive heard that in the highest degrees they have ritual where you are in a coffin, become enlightened and then salute out a window your undying guide of light Lucifer the true god and architect of the universe.
he will set you free from the rules of the tyrant who claims to have created Lucifer.
masons the men hired to build the original temple in Zion. Back with their occult from Phoenicia (tyre and Sidon) and their mystery religions of hermetic gnosticism very similar to Babylonian Qabala.
illuminated ones versus Opus Dei in Dan Brown books, but he seems to side with the all seeing eye blokes against the evil barbarian church.