Greetings and salutations, brethren,

            I hope you all are ready for an exciting Masonic year.

            In 2010 we will strengthen our Lodge by emphasizing Masonic instruction. We all get much satisfaction from performing ritual correctly. Ritual serves to strengthen the ties that bind us as a band of brothers. I want ALL officers, appointed and elected, and all other brothers who want to participate. Ritual is the essential work of all Masonic Lodges. If we do it correctly, we will experience the happiness that comes from active participation, and we will help to start new and young members of our Lodge, on the great journey to the East.

            In 2010 we will travel, taking one or two bus trips: one to the George Washington National Masonic Memorial and to the Torpedo Factory Craft Center, in Alexandria, VA, and perhaps a trip to Autumn Days in Elizabethtown. We will start a small Masonic lending library, perhaps 30 books for your reading pleasure, starting with The Lost Symbol by Dan Brown. Any suggestions will be much appreciated. We will learn much about our beloved fraternity.

            We have planned some interesting programs, including one on nuclear power, with Raymond T. George, PDDGM; one on Philadelphia city finances with Alan Butkovitz, the City Controller, who has, to my knowledge, never ducked a question; one on child advocacy with Adam Rifkind, Esq.; a patriotic program, “A Bridge of Light”, by Winton Hewitt, etc. We will arrange a Past Masters night, when a degree will be conferred by a team of Past Masters. We will visit, and be visited by other Lodges in our new district, District A. We will meet our new DDGM, Brother Robert Burns. Early in the year we will participate in a visitation by Brother Thomas K. Sturgeon, RWGM.

            All in all, 2010 is shaping up as an exciting and eventful year. I hope you are looking forward to it as much as I am.

                      Sincerely and fraternally,

                                              Eugene Rifkind, PM
                                              Worshipful Master