Michigan Masons Donate to Beautification Project

Responding to an appeal for assistance, Freemasons from the Grand Lodge of Michigan and the Prince Hall Grand Lodge of Michigan joined together in funding the sponsorship of seven trees at the Breithaupt Career and Technical Center located in Detroit. In an earlier edition of Freemasonry Today the double initiation was reported of candidates from both Grand Lodges, and fraternal relations are being further cemented by projects such as this.
    Earlier this year following a luncheon, which had been prepared and served by the students at the Center, Director Vanessa Spencer was presented with checks from Trenton-Wyandotte Lodge No.8, Ashlar Lodge No.91, Lola Valley Lodge No 583, Prince Hall Lodge No 24, Capstone Lodge No. 30, Detroit York Rite College No. 1 and Detroit Commandery No. 1, Knights Templars.
    Russell Spice, Sojourners Lodge No. 483, Richard Hietala, Lola Valley Lodge No. 583 and Corbin Elliot, Union Lodge of Strict Observance No.3 of the Grand Lodge of Michigan, together with Junior Grand Steward, Victor S. Ansett, Capstone Lodge No. 30, of the Prince Hall Grand Lodge of Michigan formed the delegation making the joint fraternal gifts. A building materials company in Detroit also made a generous donation of landscaping materials to enhance the Center’s beautification project.
    After the presentation, Russell Spice, who sits on the Advisory Board of the Center, provided an extensive tour of the facility.

Ghana Regalia Appeal

The first lodge to be formed in Ghana, then known as the Gold Coast, was Torridzonian Lodge No. 621 in 1810. In 1931, Ghana was created a District by the United Grand lodge of England, with Daniel J. Oman the first District Grand Master. The first Ghanaian mason to be awarded Grand Rank was one of the most illustrious figures in Ghanaian masonry, Sir Charles Tachie-Menson Kt CBE. Although the first two lodges in Ghana opened their doors to all men without distinction of race or creed, in the early twentieth century that began to change. The first four lodges created, between 1905 and 1914, were all European in membership. As if in answer to that, the next three, between 1918 and 1922, were all African in membership. Thus by 1931, when the District Grand Lodge was formed, the aberration of exclusively European and exclusively African lodges was well entrenched. To quote the words of one mason of the time ‘The practice was unhealthy, unpleasant and totally in conflict with the principles of Freemasonry.’ But things were to change – in 1949 the Travellers Lodge No. 6758 was formed, which was a lodge striking in many aspects, in the sheer concentration of masonic talent and civic distinction among its founders and joining members. Charles Tachie-Menson was the founding Master. This lodge broke the ice with its instant mix of African and European Brethren, and its attraction very soon demonstrated what had been a regrettable divide. In 1984 when Jerry Rawlings took over the country in a coup, Freemasonry was banned and property confiscated. Nonetheless Brethren continued to meet clandestinely until normality was restored in 1985.
    Nowadays the District is flourishing, but there is an urgent need for regalia. Will any Brethren who wish to donate masonic regalia to this appeal please send it to:
    Jonathan Ayettey, 24 Constantine House, Abbess Close, London SW2 3BN
    Tel: 079 4758 8949; or leave it with the Lodge Liaison Officer, Ian Hey, at Freemasons’ Hall, Great Queen Street, London.

Grand Master of Droit Humain Honoured by France

Professor Njördur Njardvik, International Sovereign Grand Commander of Co Masonry Le Droit Humain, has been honoured by President Jacques Chirac with the award of Chevalier of the Légion d’Honneur, one of the highest civil decorations bestowed by France. In his citation, President Chirac said: ‘This awards a humanist with great culture, who has dedicated himself for forty years to making the Icelandic language and literature better known. It also awards a man with a kind heart, who devotes himself with generosity to support the cause of children. It awards a friend of France because thanks to him the links between our two countries are reinforced.’ In a simple ceremony at the French Embassy in Reykjavík on 26 July, the French Ambassador M. Louis Bardollet invested Professor Njardvik with the medal of the Order, and in his speech laid stress on his commitment, in his capacity as Grand Master, for spiritual development.
    Njördur Njardvik was born in northwest Iceland in 1936 in a family of fishermen and netmakers. He is a graduate of the University of Iceland and the University of Göteborg, Sweden, in Icelandic, Swedish and Nordic philology. His career spans many activities: literary and drama critic, writer, teacher, director of a publishing house, university lecturer in Icelandic literature, lecturer at universities in Finland, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Hungary, Canada and the United States. He has written over 25 books and plays, and has translated many works into his native Icelandic. He is a Life Member of Clare Hall College, Cambridge and a founder and current President of SPES (Soutien Pour l’Enfance en Souffrance), an international aid organisation for children in need, running a home for abandoned children in Lomé, Togo.
    Professor Njardvik was initiated in 1958 in the International Order of Co-Freemasonry, a body not recognised by the United Grand Lodge of England. He was made an 18º Freemason in 1973, 33º in 1985 and has founded two new lodges in Iceland and has been Master of both. He was elected Grand Master for five years in 1997, and re-elected in 2002.

Lodge Archives Survive Great Fire of Chicago

Chartered in 1845, Oriental Lodge No. 33 still meets in Chicago. Not only is it the oldest lodge in the city, it is the only lodge incorporated by an act of the State Legislature, and the only lodge ever visited by ‘American Royalty’. A recent inspection of the lodge’s extensive archives resulted in the retrieval of a strongbox believed to have been used by the Secretary from the 1850s to the 1870s. It is believed he took the strongbox home for safekeeping on 9 October 1871, the night the Great Fire burned much of the city to the ground. The lodge’s existing charter drily states that it was issued ‘to replace the original lost due to fire.’
    The strongbox contained a treasure-trove of items such as ballots, trestleboards and correspondence, as well as some of the only known photos of Past Masters, including several founding fathers of the city of Chicago. The items were generally in good condition, but need now to be preserved for posterity.
    Records also show that visitors from foreign jurisdictions from around the world attended meetings, most likely while passing through Chicago on business. Especially noteworthy was a royal visit in 1875 by Brother Kalakaua, King of Hawaii and a member of the lodge ‘Le Progrès de l’Océanie’, which still exists. Accounts indicate that during his trip to the United States, he sought to witness the ceremonial splendour of Oriental Lodge’s third degree as it was then conducted, using elaborate props and special effects.
    With acknowledgment to Illinois Freemason

Recognition of Grand Lodge of Bulgaria

The United Grand Lodge of England has extended recognition to the Grand Lodge of Ancient Free and Accepted Masons of Bulgaria.
    Until three years ago there were two regular but rival Grand Lodges operating in Bulgaria. This unsatisfactory state of affairs was put right in April 2001 when Articles of Union were formally agreed and signed by the Grand Master of the Grand Lodge of Bulgaria, Yanko Bonev, and the Grand Master of the Grand Lodge of Bulgaria Ancient Free and Accepted Masons, Borislav Sarandev, forming the new Grand Lodge of Ancient Free and Accepted Masons of Bulgaria.
    In May 2001, an Extraordinary General Assembly of the Grand Lodge was held in Sofia, where the Grand Officers and members of the various Committees of the Grand Lodge were elected.
    Since the last Communication, held in 2002, a number of Brethren and entire lodges of a former breakaway group have expressed their resolve to rejoin regular Freemasonry. In response to this, the Grand Lodge has agreed to consider the applications of many of those who desired to return to its folds. In June 2003 a Ceremony for Regularization was held at which 226 Brethren and 6 Lodges were regularized. This event took place in the presence of the Grand Masters and Representatives of the Grand Lodge Alpina of Switzerland, the United Grand Lodges of Germany, the Grand Lodge of British Freemasons in Germany, the Grand Lodge of Turkey, the Grand Lodge AF&AM of Germany and the National Grand Lodge of Romania. A further 30 Brethren were regularized in November 2003. With this the Grand Lodge has completed the process of consolidation of regular Freemasonry in the Orient of Bulgaria.

200 Years Ancient and Accepted Rite in France

French Freemasons gathered once again at the end of August, at a congress which traversed the barriers of all ten different Grand Lodges, to celebrate the bicentenary of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite. The Conference, entitled Le Rite Écossais Ancien Accepté: mise en perspective historique deux siècles après (The Ancient Accepted Scottish Rite: a historical perspective after two centuries) was held at Paris in the Grand Temple at the rue Cadet premises of the Grand Orient.
    The keynote speaker was Dr. Brent Morris, Director of Heredom, the Research Society of the Southern Jurisdiction in the United States, who spoke on Predecessors of Ancient and Accepted Rite in America. Dr Morris, well-known to many masons in Britain, being a member of the Quatuor Coronati Lodge, No. 2076, identified eight masonic bodies that had established higher degrees before 1801. The Supreme Council of the United States appeared at a time when American Masons were becoming aware there was Masonic knowledge beyond the Craft. This awareness was spread by itinerant lecturers, books, and bodies of the Order of the Royal Secret. The Order, with its largely uncontrolled Inspectors, lacked the organizational infrastructure to survive, but its daughter, the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite, had the characteristics that guaranteed greatness.
    Roger Dachez, President of the Institut Maçonnique de France, laid stress on the fact that the higher degrees are essentially French – the word ‘Scottish’ was at the time a way of saying ‘higher’ or ‘more elaborated’. The higher degrees had been constructed in a way that sought to discover the lost secrets. University Professor Jean-Pierre Lassale traced some of the New Testament connections linking Freemasonry to Christianity, while Mme. Andrée Prat, University Agrégée in history, spoke of the spiritual tradition, and stressed that initiation has never been a merely temporal tradition. The 33 degrees gave the Freemason tools for spiritual perfection, she said. Yves Hivert-Messeca traced the spread of the Ancient Accepted Scottish Rite over the two hemispheres from France to North America and thence to South America, particularly Brazil.
    Pierre Mollier gave the last address, leading the audience through the formation and history of the Rite and briefly tracing a current historiography.