As we move closer to December and Installation season I can't help but reflect where we are as a fraternity and how we got here. Thinking back to my DeMolay days, our job was to pull chairs for the various Masonic installations. I remember vividly pulling chairs for WB Howard Durbin's installation and the Flint Masonic Temple was packed to the rafters, probably 400 people in attendance.
At that time GM employed thousands of people, the Flint Masonic Temple was home to 5 Masonic Lodges, 3 Eastern Star chapters, Chapter, Council and a huge Commadery. 2 Jobs bethels, DeMolay, Ladies Shrine, Amaranth and probably others that I can't recall.
Also, we had vibrant lodges in all the outlying areas along with York Rite, Eastern Star, DeMolay and Jobs.
So here we are today. This will be my third time as Worshipful Master and my Junior Warden is a Past Master. The Flint Masonic Temple is now home to 2 lodges, 1 Eastern Star, no jobs, no Demolay and the York Rite bodies are still meeting but the numbers are not there.
We still have many lodges in the surrounding areas....but we travel from lodge to lodge doing the work. As WB Carl Davis maintains we have consolidated already.....we meet in our seperate buildings for our regulars and travel all around the county doing the work. My question is do really need all the lodges we have? Our area does not have the number of people it used to have....we are maintaining these buildings working our heads off to support brick and mortar and then we travel to do the work.
Don't get me wrong....Genesee County or Ancient District 20 is alive and well and is a huge base of Masonic activity for the state but could we be more effective if we only had say 5 lodges? 1-north, 1-south, 1-east, 1-west and 1-central ......who knows I know I don't but we need to look at some options.....everyone is extremely proud of their lodge and it's heritage and rightly so.....as we travel this installation season think about this and think about what is right for the fraternity and the craft.
2 comments:
A number of years ago,2003-4 I was asked to be a member of a Long Range Planning Committee for Elf Khurafeh Temple. The Saginaw Temple was sold amd membership was declining. We were also looking for possibilities of a new home. During this same period a number of Lodges were experiencing financial difficulties.
The committee submitted a preliminary report which contained numerous suggestions. One of these dealt specifically with the lodge problems. This suggestion was to add-on or build a stand alone Lodge room at Circus Park where Lodges could rent meeting space.
This thought didn't go anywhere with Elf Khurafeh but, it could be done easily with an existing facility. In fact, there has been at least 4 consolidations since that time. It's just a matter of time.
I agree brother it is just a matter of time. We will eventually have to make some tough decisions. While we are finally starting to see some light with membership growth it's not enough to support all of the buildings we have.
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