The North Carolina Mason

is belonging that will keep you coming. Every service award I have given out this year, including two 75-year awards, has been to men who, even in their advanced years, are still involved in their lodge with a strong sense of belonging. So practically, how do we do this? We could come up with a lot of elaborate events and programs, but let's just keep it simple. After all, if you've only got 8-14 showing up for a stated communication, you don't really have a lot of footmen to pull off a big event. As simple as it sounds, start with a meal. I don't mean the lodge meal, but just invite brothers to meet at the lodge for lunch next Tuesday and head down the street to the diner. Grab biscuits one Saturday morning at Bojangles and hang out at the lodge. A previous secretary of our lodge created what he called the Square and Compass. Every Friday he just put out some snacks and drinks in the secretary's office and brothers showed up for a cookie and brotherhood. They still do. In addition to breaking bread together, go bowling, go fishing. Set a time and location for a hike, a bike ride, a walk... and while we love our spouses, partners, and children, and want to have events that welcome them, we need also need time when it's just about brothers. I love being in community with men who are young enough to be my son and old enough to be my dad, but we are brothers just the same. I love being in lodge with men of different religions, ethnicities, politics, socioeconomics, and races. Our commonality of being men who believe in a higher power and who believe in the fundamental equality of all human beings is what brings us together in ways that the outside world does not, but in ways that the outside world absolutely needs. Bringing diverse but like-minded men together is the hallmark of Freemasonry. I was asked a few weeks again by a young Master, if I was master of a lodge again what would I do, if I could do just one thing. Without hesitation I said I would start the meeting at six and then have dinner at 7:00, 7:30. The tradition in our lodge, probably like yours, is dinner before the meeting. I really like the lodges I have visited where we they have dinner after the meeting. Frankly it kept the meeting on task, and then we could hang out and wax upon Masonry and life around the table as long as we wanted, and then head to the pub or backyard for a refreshing adult beverage. Let's be honest, it is often around the table and on the barstool that belonging is best cultivated. Frankly, the absence of this kind of socialization is what has made the past three years so hard. Covid made it difficult to be in community, and it hurt our fraternity and our society in ways we are only now beginning to realize and understand. But brotherly love will prevail. After all, what's the first tenet of Masonry? Brotherly love. Without brotherly love there is neither relief nor truth. I grew up a working-class country boy from Appalachia, and there's a lot I don't know, but there is one thing I know for sure and one thing that I know for certain, which is that belonging in our fraternity and belonging in our communities, that belonging that comes from meeting on the level, that belonging that comes from loving our neighbors, is what will make our fraternity thrive and consequently our communities prosper. Brothers, as we bring 2023 to a close, let's recommit ourselves to our fraternalism and to creating that sense of belonging that we all need. For all that we may do as Masons, we are at our foundation a fraternity of men, a band of brothers, who meet on the level and act by the plumb. Our bonds of friendship and brotherhood will not only serve ourselves, but each other, and our communities as well. The world needs Masonry more than ever before. So let us work together in harmony as we hue our ashlars toward perfection. May God bless you and your families, may He bless our fraternity, and may He bless our neighbors. FA L L 2 0 2 3 | 5

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