Mitton Lodge No.6904

With the sad news that this website will stop working in a few months’ time we are delighted to announce that Mitton Lodge now has a new website.

For all our news and events please now visit https://mitton-6904.masonicwebsite.org

No further updates will be made to this old site.

Monday 6^th March was our penultimate meeting of the season at Mitton Lodge in Stourport. We were holding a passing ceremony for one of your recent initiates, everyone was up to scratch on their ritual, and we were ready to go.

A few days earlier our lodge mentor was chatting to our brother and learnt that he probably wasn’t going to be able to make the meeting. Oh no, not a demonstration, I hear you all cry out, well no.

Having received written approval, Mitton Lodge was going to pass a brother from a different lodge, our friend, Wyche Lodge. Many of our brethren are members of both so our WM (and there DC) and our secatary (and their WM) jointly, with the assistance of brethren from both lodges, excellently carried out this ceremony.

We had our IG present the extended version of the Working Tools for his first time. He was truly amazing, word perfect, a good steady pace, good voice inflection and he didn’t need a single prompt, really, not one.

We also had our SD present the tracing board, which was again, simply outstanding. I had heard him previously do the extended version but happily, as we were all getting a bit peckish, he had been asked to keep it to the standard version.

Due to unfortunate circumstances, we also many brethren being asked to cover roles at very short notice and again they were all brilliant.

It was also such happy occasion, everyone was so positive about the evening.

Our festive board was again delicious. As it was our WM’s last evening as WM, we all assisted in singing of the WM’s song, ably led by one of our brothers. We thanked our WM for all he had manged to achieve during his year and ended with a toasted to him.

And next month, yes, the installation of our new WM and we only went and got allocated the Provisional A team!

Ladies Lunch

This last Sunday our WM hosted his Ladies Lunch at the Crown and Sandys in Ombersley. It was such a wonderfully happy and relaxed affair. Everyone seemed so pleased to attend our first non-masonic social event since COVID restrictions were lifted.

Many of the brothers had also invited their family and friends and this made the lunch a truly multi-generational event and was so much better for it. It was also very well supported by members of Wyche Lodge, our WM’s mother lodge, and to which our WM is still a very active member.

Everyone looked so well turned-out and there was this delightful hum of chatting and laughing around the, full to capacity, Orangery. The food was impressive, particularly for the amount of people being served at once, the company was captivating and at the end of the lunch the WM presented the Ladies with a beautiful gift.

The raffle, in aid of the WM wife’s preferred charity, Smile Train, which helps families, supporters and medical professionals transform the lives of babies born with cleft lips and palates. The raffle made a generous amount. This may be partly due the very friendly and enthusiastic ticket selling techniques.

Everyone retired replete and having had such a wonderful lunch, so we need a huge well-done and thank-you to everyone involved in its organisation and the team at the Crown and Sandys.

Mitton Lodge 6904 6^th February 2023

“Well, that’s how you do ceremony” came the quiet comment to me from one our most respected brothers. Our Deputy Provisional Grand Master had just sat down having delivered his brilliant address.

It was wonderful to see yet more brothers being able to return to lodge meetings and with a healthy amount of visitors the lodge was well supported last night.

With the subject matter of the evening, it was unfortunate that a newly initiated visiting brother couldn’t make it but our newly initiated bother was present and attentive.

After our opening and usual greetings etc. we received a short paper (with a long title) from our Bro. Secretary, 'The origins and development of the modern tracing-board set within an evolving Lodge Room’ which was derived mostly from our amazing masonic web resource, Solomon. It was beautifully delivered and a great introduction to our next address.

Here our Deputy Provisional Grand Master presented a version of “An explanation of the first degree tracing-board”. This was yet another amazing “first” for most of us. It was created by an amalgamation of a rare but published Devonian version and the more known standard version. It was explained to us that, where the normal version manages to use a few words to explain a point the Devonian version uses at least three paragraphs of text and where the Devonian version uses only a few short words, the normal version uses paragraphs. This was huge piece of work to learn, to retain and then to deliver so well. It was even more special, as the delivery was so good, keeping us all so enthralled throughout.

Much discussion and great thanks were given to our Deputy Provisional Grand Master which were well received.

The other matters of business all completed well and everyone retired to our amazing festive board. Much fun was had by all including the many toasts and speeches all whilst raising impressive amounts for our charities.

If you think you might enjoy hearing more about what it’s all about, please do get in touch and we can arrange a quick informal chat.

Monday 2nd Jan 2023

Wow, what a start to 2023, an amazing initiation, a haggis night and all with the huge support from visitors from far and wide.

Due to many unfortunate personal reasons we were short of some roles. We had a hugely supportive friend and visitor of the lodge acting as our DC. I mentioned that he was so good that he reminded me of a provisional DC, it turns out that he has held that acting rank! We had our very own passed acting Grand Officer as SW and our very own previously acting provisional DC acting as JD. Our brilliant IG was the only brother who hadn’t been through the chair.

We had a wide range of other high ranking Grand and Provisional visitors including an acting Grand Officer and a few acting Provisional Officers so no pressure! It was also great to see so many recently initiated brother visitors probably seeing what happened to them so recently, for the first time.

It was either going to be a disaster or an amazing experience and I’m pleased to report it was the latter, assisted no doubt by a positive and confident initiate and all the hard work all our WM and his officers put in.

The WTs were delivered word perfectly and without a single prompt by our hugely impressive IG.

Like many, as JW I have done the charge only requiring the odd prompt. I have seen quite a few doing it better than I could but the delivery of The Charge was this evening, simply brilliant, delivered with such meaning, so clear to comprehend with not a single prompt being needed and all of us paying full attention.

Our officers reported their news with our lodges generous charitable giving being well noted. Hopefully with final pushes from all lodges, our provisional target will be met, even with the COVID trials and tribulations! We will find out in a few weeks!

The festive board was delicious and great fun with the hum of friendly chatting, smiling faces and laughter throughout the evening. We did miss our normal piper who was, for the first time ever, too poorly to play as he was still recovering from a nasty respiratory bug. We wish him a speedy and full recovery.

The speeches/toasts all went well and our Grand Officer kindly agreed and, as you might expect, did an excellent job of responding to the Visitor’s toast.

Mitton’s singing was again strong and a brother visitor from Wyche gave us a different explanation of the chain which was yet another brilliant first.

Thank you to all our visitors for being so supportive and giving our initiate such a great welcome to masonry. We hope to see you all again soon.

If you are reading this and feel you might enjoy masonry at Mitton Lodge and would like an explorative informal chat and/or if you are considering re-joining a lodge, please get in touch.

Mitton Lodge News Update December 2022

Another evening of advancement and fun but no initiation unfortunately. Our candidate realised that he couldn’t make Mondays so we had to let him go…………… to another lodge that meets in our Stourport Lodge rooms on a different day of the week. We wish him well and hope to catch up with his progress over the coming years.

Our W Master was at a Chapter (Royal Arch) meeting and was taken by a companion who delivered a hugely interesting lecture of the history of Craft and Chapter. With no candidate for our next meeting, he asked if would be possible to adapt the lecture for use in a craft lodge. In less than two weeks this was both achieved and approved.

So last Monday we received this new and enlightening lecture which was both “Billed” as and definitely was, a “different perspective” of Chapter. Everyone agreed that it was a truly interesting and well delivered lecture. If you get the chance, it is definitely worth attending.

Due to various unfortunate reasons, it was necessary for brothers, at the last minute, to take on additional roles. Well you wouldn’t have known, everyone was amazing. The evening went without a hitch and we retired to the festive board in very good spirit.

The Christmas fayre food was again outstanding as were the speeches. Our stand-in DC tried a couple of additional elements, which most have experience at other lodges but were new to Mitton and they were, well received. They may yet become new traditions.

Initiation and Haggis Night

Next month we have an initiation as part of our acclaimed Haggis Night which includes our brilliant piper along with our delicious festive board. Do please look to join us on this most special occasion.

Merry Christmas and very happy new year from our W Master, his officers and the members of Mitton Lodge.

Mitton Lodge News Update October 2022

We had good numbers for our meeting held on Monday 3rd October 2022. Clearly many had heard just how good our visiting speaker was.  “The second degree charge and tracing board put into a historical context” was truly amazing, the delivery was wonderfully charismatic, the knowledge encyclopaedic and this fast paced presentation kept us all enthralled from start to finish. If you ever get the chance to hear it, it’s most definitely worth attending.

We should mention the huge support we received from members of Wyche Lodge who bolstered our numbers beautifully.

We have two new initiates over our next two meetings. It’s always wonderful to experience a new person joining the craft, a day that they will never forget!

I should also mention our legionary Haggis night which I believe will be held Monday 2^nd January 2023. This will also be an initiation, so a truly wonderful evening of celebrations.

Well we are back!

Monday 3^rd was our first meeting of the season. It was a demonstration of the ceremony of initiation which went extremely well, probably because all but the IG were WBro’s, our JD and SW both being unavailable. We wish our SW a swift and complete recovery.

Our IG’s presentation of the working tools was “word perfect”, without a stutter, he is definitely going to go far.

We also welcomed back a WBro, which due to COVID and family commitments, had needed to stay away. He is back now and even “volunteered” to be our candidate.

We have two new members joining this season with the first planned for our December meeting and the other for our January meeting. We look forward to their imitations and then their progress in the craft over the coming years.

We are also so pleased that our caterers have been able to continue providing us with their excellent meals for our festive board. They have been with us for over 10 years and we feel so grateful that they have agreed to stay with us.

It looks like we have an excellent season ahead of us. If you would like to visit us, you would be most welcome. Please contact our secretary.

We have all been having fun during our summer training where we practice our new positions within the lodge. New and old words to recall and deliver having spent many hours studying our little blue books.

Our first meeting of the season is on Monday 3^rd October 2022 and we are looking forward to meeting up again and catching up on each other’s news.

We have two new members looking to join us, ne in December and the other in January, if everything goes to plan! We always welcome enquiries at any time of the year, so if you think Free Masonry might be of interest to you, please contact us for a chat. The best method is by visiting our website. https://mitton-6904.masonic-website.org

We know COVID still represents a problem to some of members and hope that they may wish to return sometime this season but understand if they don’t. It would wonderful to have you back.

We also know that some can’t make it dues to ill health. We wish you a speedy recovery and we will keep in touch with you.

We have our official practice and management meeting on the 19^th September at 7 pm to which every member is most welcome.

Here we go again, oh the excitement!

 

Henry