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 2007 Newsletters
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Minnesota River Valley Lodge #6 June 2007 Volume #9, Issue #06 "Issued with the Permission of the M.W. Grand Lodge of Minnesota"
From the Master’s Desk, Brethren, Look back to the beginning
of 2006, we had too few goals.
We now have many programs and our focus is on maintaining momentum. We have
outstanding new Master Masons. I
am confident we have added enough engineers and trackmen to keep our train
going forward. I have used a Horizontal
or sideways managerial style. I am better suited to it. (Another style is
Rank or a top on down style). We
have advanced because of our unity, rather than any managerial style. We are
successful because we share Masonic Values. As a lodge we engage ideas, we
have a can do attitude, we develop leadership and we enjoy all we do
together. We ARE heavily invested
in, Lodging, the end of our lease is in 7 plus years. The Director of Fraternal
Operations will honor us with his presence at our August stated. RWB
I HOPE we become heavily invested in, Masonic Helping
Hands for Veterans (MHHV).
Catchy Huh?
A new moniker by Brother Tom Smith
for what had been called The Returning Vets Program. Acting Chairman Brother
Tom has made numerous telephone contacts including to Brother Smith will arrange
a lodge meeting to define the focus/purpose for MHHV.
We defined a great Mission Statement in '04 and we can do it again. Set the Craft to work and
watch what we achieve. An Irish Proverb: FAIR AND
EASY GO FAR IN A DAY
WISDOM OF LARRY THE CABLE GUY: 15. When
everything is coming your way, you're in the wrong lane. 16. Hard
work pays off in the future. Laziness pays off now. 17. How
much deeper would the ocean be without sponges 18.
Eagles may soar, but weasels don't get sucked into jet engines 19. What
happens if you get scared half to death, twice? 21.
Inside every older person is a younger person wondering, "What the heck
happened? 22. Just
remember -- if the world didn't suck, we would all fall off. 23. Light
travels faster than sound. That's why some people appear bright until you
hear them speak. 24. Life
isn't like a box of chocolates. It’s more like a jar of jalapenos.
What you do today, might burn your butt tomorrow The
LEO Corner The question for May
was: Define Hele: Hail:
Hale: Heal. I received a great answer
from our new Brother Tom Smith. He's been doing his research.
First I will give the answer that I had and then include Brother Tom's more
detailed answer concerning the work Hele. The first three words are
pronounced alike, but with different meanings. Hele (Anglo-Saxon) is
an old word meaning to cover, conceal. Hail is to greet. Hale
means hearty, well. Heal means to make well. "Hele and conceal"
is one of the many word pairs in ritual work which go back to the growth of
the English language, when two words were often used to insure that the
hearer understood the meaning of at least one. Now Brother Tom's
explanation of Hele. Much has been written on
that small word that is used in combination with the words "conceal" and
"reveal." Disputes still arise from time to time among some brethren about
the word, especially its pronunciation. Some say The question for June
is: Why does the Master wear a
hat? Upcoming education
programs: July - Your LEO will
present a paper on "Freemasonry and College Fraternities" August - In keeping with
our goal of becoming better informed about the various Masonic affiliated
organizations, WB Jerry Oliver will be speaking to us about the Scottish
Rite. WB Jerry is the Sovereign Grand Inspector General for the
Scottish Rite in the state of Email -
leo@mn-rivervalley.org Submitted by
Job's Daughters News from On Saturday, June 9th,
2007 Bethel 85 of Shakopee held their open installation of officers at the
Minnesota Masonic Home. The installation ceremony was conducted in the
beautiful Landmark Room. Honored Queen Kellie chose the Rose Festival
narration for the installation. Her colors are yellow and teal. & her
mascot is the Rubber Duck.
The following girls were
installed: Honored Queen Kellie Seberson, Sr. Princess Alicia Vitali,
Jr. Princess BriAnna Magnuson, Guide Toni Holdshoe, Marshal Katie Holdshoe,
Recorder Ashley Bican, 4th Messenger Cassi Magnuson, 5th
Messenger Polly Price & Inner Guard Alyssa Walstrom. Chaplain Courtney
Jacobs, Sr. Custodian Taylor Jacobs and Jr. Custodian Jasmine Thompson will
be installed at our next meeting along with our new Bethel Guardian Council.
Photo: (L to R) Ashley
Bican, Cassi Magnuson, Katie Holdshoe, Alica Vitali, Kellie Seberson,
BriAnna Magnuson, Toni Holdshoe, Alyssa Wahlstrom, Polly Price. (not
pictured: Courtney Jacobs, Taylor Jacobs and Jasmine Thompson)
The Chaplain’s Corner
What’s in a name?
The etymology of names (the meaning of names) is quite a science and
requires research into history, sociology, paleontology, and a bunch of
other “ologys”. For example, when looking up my name, I find
that the meaning of “Alan” is not known for
certain, though it possibly means either "little rock" or "handsome" in
Breton, or perhaps "harmony" or "concord" in the Celtic.
Hey, I am handsome, I am a Mason, and I sing.
Can’t get any more harmonious than that. Seems like a good fit for me.
Other
names tend to be much more certain. Our Worshipful Master’s name, Michael,
comes from Michaelmas, the name
of an archangel. Literally, the name means "Who is like God". As he is known
to say on occasion, his power is “well nigh onto absolute”. Sure sounds like
an archangel to me. Lou is from the German for
“famous warrior”. Just what a Junior Warden should be. And of course our
Senior Warden’s name, Timothy, is also well suited and means “one who honors
God”, or is “valued of God”.
But when we get to the name of God, we find quite a varied list of names.
For Muslims, God is called Allah (with 99 variations), and
for Hindus, Vishnu (with 1000 variations). Nearly every
culture/religion/orthodoxy has a number of names and variations that they
use to refer to God.
The Native Americans
had - and still have! - a huge respect for nature. Animals had powerful
spirits that were worshiped as gods and it was necessary to thank them and
placate them if you wanted to make a meal of them. When corn came by
courtesy of the deities, it was also given its due measure of respect.
You could see into the souls of the Beaver, Badger and
"To the Hopi, the Great Spirit
is all powerful. He taught us how to live, to worship, where to go and what
food to carry, gave us seeds to plant and harvest. He gave us a set of
sacred stone tablets into which he breathed all teachings in order to
safeguard his land and life. In these stone tablets were inscribed
instructions, prophecies and warnings."
Hmmm, it almost sounds like Christianity. As with others, Christianity has
quite a number of names for God, some evolving from the Hebraic orthodoxy
and some from the Greek. Names like El (used 250 times in the Old Testament
and
linguistically equivalent to the Moslem Allah),
Yahweh (meaning
mighty, strong, prominent), Adonai
(meaning Lord), Melekh (meaning King), and of course Jehovah and the Great I
Am. The terms we use today represent the belief in a single God, which is
based on Elohim, the Aramaic representation of Gods (plural). This may in fact be
the origin of the triune God. Christian orthodoxy has always understood God
to be One God in Three Persons
-- of
Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
The Great Spirit as well as the other names for Deity are all generally
considered equivalent in description to the Christian God. He is
all-powerful, all-knowing, and all-loving. We all believe that God speaks
through human
intermediaries, and issues spiritual laws that human beings are to
follow in order to earn the
afterlife
promised.
But more than this, the Christian view of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit
speaks of relationships. The Father/God guides and brings His children light
and love. The Son/God represents God among man and encourages us to love our
God as a son loves his father. And the Holy Spirit/God is His presence
within us.
Masons are men of good character with a firm faith in God, and are accepted
as our brothers. The Masonic teachings and the mysteries bind us even
further to those great lessons taught through the words in our Book of
Sacred Laws, the Holy Bible. It is one of the tenets of our beloved
fraternity that we should offer prayer to our God before any important
endeavor. This is the relationship we have with our God and the practices we
are taught so that we may continually improve on that relationship. It will
be reflected in our actions toward ourselves, our family, our brothers, and
our community. In short, it makes us what we are – good men and true.
What’s in a name? Everything.
Prayers
for our Brothers and their Families
Please feel free to send me the names of any of our
Brothers and/or their family members, who may be in distress as we pray to
our creator for their comfort and relief. When we think of our experiences
in taking the third degree, we cannot help but remember the words from
Ecclesiastes: “Remember now thy creator . . .”
and please remember those listed below in your prayers. We name the
welfare of our brethren in our petitions because we love them; and knowing
our own need of their prayers, we realize their need of ours.
Be still – and know. . .
Email Addresses I would like to take this
opportunity and ask everyone to please keep the Lodge informed of any email
address changes that you may have.
With the ever changing world with technology we continue to use
emails and our Website to communicate Lodge events and communications that
need to be sent out. If you
happen to have an email address or a new email address and would like to add
it to our distribution list, please send them to Steve Scheffert at
ska@huntel.net.
I will forward them onto our
Secretary for the database once we have them in our distribution list.
For those that have emails with us, please remember that if your
email stops working and we get error messages back that they are
undeliverable, we remove your email from the distribution list. Thank You, Steve
The View from the By having two teenage
children in our household, it occurred to me the other night during Degree
work (which has been occurring quite often this year) of another correlation.
We, as Masons, are taught that operative masons worked their way up
from Entered Apprentices, to Fellowcrafts and then when at complete
maturity, moved onto Masters where they could freely travel to other towns
and villages to work as they pleased..
This freedom was not permitted to the lower (younger) ranked workers.
It dawned on me – isn’t that what we do as we raise our children? Teach them the tools and life skills to become worthy citizens. Once they have matured to a level where they have mastered these skills, we let them go out on their own, as they please. Matured to a level where they are willing to accept and embrace the responsibilities that comes with their newly obtained freedom. Here again, another
example that suggests that the Masonic lessons which we are taught, are
ubiquitous. -- Lew
The
The date for the second
annual
We will again be playing at
Following golf, we will all gather at the Loutzenhiser’s for a social time
and burgers on the grill. We are
less than 15 minutes from the golf course and directions will be provided.
The course is nine holes, par 28/29 and all those who participated last year
had a good time.
Each golfer will be responsible for his/her own green fees.
There will be a nominal donation of $10 per person to cover the food
and prizes.
This event is open to members, spouses, OES members and spouses, as well as
guests. This would be a good
time to introduce someone to Masonry in a social setting.
To reserve your Tee-time contact:
Bill Allen 952-440-663
Reservations are needed prior to July 14.
We hope to see a good turnout for this event.
This is How to Plant, Nurture, and Harvest a
Superior Garden How to Plant Your Garden First, you come to the
garden alone, while the dew is still on the roses.... FOR THE GARDEN OF YOUR
DAILY LIVING,
PLANT FOUR ROWS OF LETTUCE:
NO GARDEN SHOULD BE WITHOUT TURNIPS:
TO CONCLUDE OUR GARDEN WE MUST HAVE THYME:
WATER FREELY WITH PATIENCE
AND CULTIVATE WITH LOVE.
THERE IS MUCH FRUIT IN YOUR GARDEN BECAUSE YOU REAP WHAT YOU SOW. Submitted by
Correct Pronunciation of Masonic Words This Appeared in the
summer 2007 issue of the MISSOURI FREEMASON magazine, which I receive as
dual member with Jonesburg Lodge #457 A.F. & A.M. of Breth-ren is two syllables: th is soft, as in breathe (not as in breath); not brotheren or bretheren. Omitting plurals: Add s to the pronunciation of words like Entered Apprentices (ap-pren-ti-ces, not appren-tice): Lodge of Fellow Crafts (not Fellow Craft) Artificer is ar-Tif-icer, not ar-Tis-ifer. I hear this 90% of the time. Think of artifice or artificial to get the sound. Imprecations (not implications). The word imprecations means curses, whereas implications means inferred or suggested meaning. Shewed is pronounced showed not shoed The Latin phrase Holy of Holies is Sanctum Sancto-rum, not sancto-ri-um Be sure M & T are EXcepted, not ACcepted. Accessory sounds like ak-sess-ory, not assessory The fourth Perfect of P of E is PEE-dal, not PED-al. H arassed is HAR-isd, not har-ASSEDUnerring is un-URR-ing, not un-Ear-ing Barbarous is BAR-ba-rous, not bar-BER-i-ous Submitted by: Bill Tuttle
KidsID – at the State Fair! Your Lodge has committed
to work two shifts at the KidsID booth at the Minnesota State Fair
again this year on Friday, August 31, 2007.
Free Gate passes will be supplied to all volunteers to help reduce
out-of –pocket expenses.
Shift times are 9:00 AM – 1:00 PM and 1:00 PM – 5:00 PM.
We need a total of 16 volunteers, 8 for each shift. As many of our brothers
know, but some of our new members may not, KidsID is a program sponsored and
funded by the Grand Lodge of Minnesota.
Many of the Blue Lodges within the state help by organizing,
setting-up and staffing KidsId booths - usually during special events in
their local communities.
What is involved in working Kidsid?
It is really simple. For
each child, we provide finger prints of their index fingers, their weight,
their height and a digitized picture (on a 3.5 floppy) – all given to
the parents to take home and keep in a safe place.
If, God forbid, the child should ever become missing, the parents
have this information readily available to give to the law enforcement
organizations as quickly as possible. This program is provided
at no cost to the public.
The Grand lodge loans out the cameras and provides the supplies - Our own WB BEST OF ALL, IT’S FUN, AS
WELL AS REWARDING!!! If you are interested in
working either of these shifts, please contact
How Full Is You Bucket Submitted by: I recently attended a
business seminar, the content of which, was much better than the title. The
title had something to do with “How Full Is You Bucket”. The seminar was
given by the author of a book from the business press of the same name, Tom
Rath. The thesis of the
discussion was everyone carries around an imaginary bucket with them, the
bucket being a metaphor for positive feelings, emotions and overall well
being. We also have a dipper with us which we use, sometimes purposefully
and sometimes without even knowing we’re doing so, to either fill or take
from other peoples buckets. The good news is, when you fill other peoples
buckets, you in turn fill your own. When your bucket is full, you feel good,
when it’s empty, you feel awful. A very simple explanation
of some powerful concepts. While it’s a no brainier
to proclaim “positive good, negative bad”, in the discussion Rath went on to
explain some of the more startling aspects of full and empty buckets. Since
he is writing for a business audience, of course he made several connections
to productivity and the cost to business from people feeling not engaged.
But he also talked about the very serious impact to ones health and
wellbeing, which having an “empty bucket” can result. The most startling was is
his discussion of the Korean War, specifically the North Korean POW camps
where American prisoners were held during the war. In these camps, 38% of
the prisoners, the highest rate of any war in our history. Why? North Korean
prison camps were not particularly brutal from torture perspective. The men
were fed and house adequately to meet their needs. There were actually very
few incidents of physical abuse reported from these camps. What happened
then? Upon re-patronization to
the With more research the
Dr’s learned that the North Koreans had developed a very rigorous and
systematic “weapon” to use against the men, relentless negativity. By
constant criticism, withholding all emotional support and fostering
distrust, the North Koreans were able to effectively break the very will of
these men to live. While the purpose was to break the chain of command among
prisoners in the camps, the real effect was to reduce the men the men to
near hopeless desperates, lacking every connection to home, and to each
other. During the time these men were held, they were led to believe that no
one cared about them. As bad as this example is,
there are equally positive examples of how giving people positive feedback,
a kind word, support, can have just as dramatic beneficial impact on people,
promoting health and well being, boosting productivity in the workplace. Sitting in on the seminar
the facilitator asked us to think about those things which “fill our
buckets”, Family? Faith? Things you enjoy doing, I’m happy to report that
attending lodge functions ranks high on that list. I see Lodge as a place
where you can gain needed respite from the things going on in all our lives
which cause stress and concern, empting the bucket as the parable would go. Keep in mind Brothers,
filling others buckets, you also fill your own. Personally, I think that
just might be one of secrets, but one which should be sharing with rest of
the world without.
Volunteers Needed for Shakopee 150th
Anniversary Celebration The 150th
Anniversary Committee (of which I am a member) is still in need of up to six
people to help with grilling. 2
grills are being donated by Total Rental.
All the food items will be provided.
We would be doing the grilling of hot dogs, brats and hamburgers.
They need us to work Saturday, June 30, 11:00 AM to 3:00 PM at If you are available, please give me a call (612-418-7954) as soon as possible so that I can notify the planning (volunteer) committee. There are going to be a lot of fun activities throughout the day on Saturday…something for everyone. A complete list of these activities will be appearing in the Shakopee Valley News. Thanks, Brother
July Birthdays Our best wishes to the following brothers who will celebrate their birthday in July:
Newsletter Articles for the next newsletter will be due by June 13th. You may send articles to me for the newsletter; by any method you desire (email, fax, regular mail, etc…). Articles that are not received by the due date will be held over for the newsletter. We would also like to encourage the other organizations that are affiliated with MN River Valley Lodge #6, such as the Jobs Daughters, Eastern Star, Demolay, etc… to feel free to contribute items to our newsletter and to our Lodge’s Web Calendar. Thank You, Steve Scheffert (news@mn-rivervalley.org) 2224 Birch Circle Blair, NE 68008 Fax: 402-533-8344
Explanation of Life Submitted by: On the first day, God
created the dog and said:
List of Upcoming Events: June 17th – Fathers Day
July
Visit the
Lodge Website and view the Lodge calendar for our complete list of events.
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