Greetings Brethren,

Raytown Lodge continues to be a very active and busy group with many exciting happenings. The lodge is busy preparing for our summer fundraising activities. Junior Warden Tony Mesa is coordinating sign-ups for staffing the fireworks tent. If you can assist, even with one shift, please contact Tony to sign up. The fireworks tent is our largest single fundraising activity and the more shifts we can cover with our own members and family the less we will have to share the proceeds with other groups.

The barbecue committee is also hard at work preparing for the 2nd annual barbecue competition. Activities so far are encouraging and we hope to have even better participation than last year from both teams competing and sponsors. Please contact our Marshall, Mike Gatchet or myself for any additional information or if you would like to assist in the preparations for this fun event.

On the membership front we recently conferred a second degree, and now have two Fellow Crafts who we are preparing to raise to Master Mason. We also have one Entered Apprentice awaiting his second degree, and one petition out for investigation. Look for a special meeting soon to confer degrees.

I’m pleased to report that the lodge continues to work toward our Gold ritual award. We are splitting up the qualification for this award into three blocks, and have successfully completed the first block and are working on the second. We hope to complete the second block in the next couple of weeks, and complete the entire process by the end of June. The third block requires the participation of at least 22 Master Masons who must be lodge members, so all active Master Masons may be called upon to assist with this important event.

The lodge held our annual picnic this past weekend. Although there was competition with many events including several graduations and other functions, we had a nice turnout and those in attendance had a great afternoon.

As always, we encourage all members to attend our stated communications. We usually have a very good turnout with great food and fellowship, and welcome our members and other brethren. Even if you haven’t attended lodge in some time, please join us. We can help you with meeting ritual if you are a little rusty. As a reminder, stated meetings are the first and third Thursdays of each month, except for July and August. Dinner is served beginning around 6:30 and the meeting time is 7:30pm. We hope to see you there!

Fraternally,
Steven Holbrook
Worshipful Master