Welcome Brother Becvar

We took pleasure in initiating Mr. Becvar into our craft on Monday night and are now pleased to call him Brother!

Please welcome Brother Becvar the next time you see him. He has now entered upon the first of many steps in his Masonic journey.

Thank you also to all of the traveling Brothers who participated in this joyous occasion. We had Brothers helping from Murrieta, Oceanside, and Fallbrook. We also had some first visitors from numerous lodges outside as well as support from our district Brethren from Hemet and Menifee.

Such a great night for us in Masonry.

B∴ Taggett

First Mystery Dinner 2019

Temecula Freemasons successfully held our first Mystery Dinner of the new year.

Including Brothers, Sisters, children, and guests we had a total of 22 people in attendance.

As with most of our mystery dinner events we stayed locally in Temecula. Everyone enjoyed their meal and no one had a single complaint about the food served.

We’d highly suggest Il Tramonto Ristorante in old town. Although we were a fairly large party the food was delicious and the service was reasonable for a Saturday.

Hope to see everyone plus more at our next one.

F∴ & S∴

Brother Taggett

This Week’s Masonic Events (14 January)

Good Day Brethren, Sisters and Visitors,

This year is really starting to pick up. Here are the upcoming events for the remainder of the week.

Tonight (14 January) – We’re hosting Officer’s School of Instruction which starts at 7 PM. (Master Masons)

Saturday (19 January) – Mystery Dinner. We meet at the lodge at 5 PM and then caravan to a local restaurant. Please RSVP as the place we’re going to isn’t a very large venue. (Public Welcome)

Looking forward to seeing each of you there!

F∴ & S∴

Brother Taggett

Temecula Masons Food Drive

This years food drive was a success! We fed almost 100 families that live in and around Temecula plus an additional 200 families in surrounding cities. In total the Temecula Freemasons along with the Brothers from Hemet and Menifee fed 300 families. Each family received enough food to last them twenty plus days during this holiday season.

Temecula worked in conjunction with a local nonprofit by the name of Community Mission of Hope to find the families in need. The early morning crew arrived at 7:30 AM to go retrieve and load the food from the local distribution areas.

Family members of all ages were present to help distribute the food with the youngest daughter being only 4 years old and the oldest Master Mason at 71 years old. There were also many helping hands from our local Jobs Daughters Bethel #165.

Our goal is to continue raising the number of families we can support each year. This year there was a small hiccup with the supplier which didn’t allow us to provide for as many families as initially hoped.

We raise money through Charity Golf tournaments put together by Worshipful Brother Allan Bowman and donations provided by Brothers throughout the year. This year a big thank you goes to TemCat Worshipful Brothers Carl Black and John Mc Goldrick because without them Temecula Catalina Island Lodge wouldn’t have been able to support even a single family.

This was a very successful year for local Community Outreach. Let us make an even bigger difference in 2019 with the support of each Brother of our lodge.

F∴ & S∴

Bro∴ Taggett

Winterfest 2018 at Temecula Catalina Lodge

Yesterday, we had a wonderful Winterfest celebration. Which included plenty of food, family and friends. Another added bonus, we had two Lance Corporals from the United States Marine Corps join us. They picked up our Toys for Tots donations.


We started at 4:00 PM and carried on for several hours with light holiday music playing in the background. W∴ M∴ English gave a nice thank you speech which included mentioning the Toys for Tots. It was a joint effort from everyone and not anyone in particular. We had three turkeys, a baked ham, different types of casseroles, and plenty of scratch made items.

A special thanks goes to W∴ B∴ Black for his efforts in setting up the dining room and B∴ Sec∴ Hafeli for cooking two turkeys. Also to the clean up crew which was mostly B∴ Tribble (dish duty), B∴ Santos, Mr. Lopez (applicant), and Mr. Evans (prospect).

Time to Celebrate at Temecula Catalina Island Lodge of Masons

Welcome Brothers, Sisters, and Guests,

It’s that time of year again to celebrate. This being the first one scheduled by our new Worshipful Master Robb English. He’s looking forward to hosting you and your family.

This Saturday, 15 December 2018, we will be having a Winterfest. Otherwise known as a holiday-themed party. No need to dress up (unless you want to) because the only thing holiday about it is the food and maybe some music.

The festivities begin at 4:00 PM and all we ask is that you RSVP so we ensure to have enough food for everyone to enjoy. Bring the wife, husband, kids, family, and friends.
Date: 15 December 2018Time: 4:00 PM to whenever

RSVP below.

Temecula Catalina Island Lodge Installation of Officers 2018-2019

You are cordially invited to the public ceremony and installation of the
2018-2019 Officers of
Temecula Catalina Island Lodge No. 524 F&AM of California.

Temecula Catalina Freemason Lodge Aprons

This fourth day of December in the year of two thousand and eighteen at four O’clock in the evening at our Lodge.

The address is provided below and an Irish themed dinner will be provided afterwards.

From our family to yours, we look forwards to seeing you there.

The Story Behind the Masonic Forget Me Not

THE STORY BEHIND MASONIC FORGET ME NOT

Masonic Forget me not emblem

In the years between World War 1 and World War 2 The blue Forget Me Not Emblem (Das Vergissmeinnicht) was a standard symbol used by most charitable organizations in Germany, with a very clear meaning: “Do not forget the poor and the destitute“.

It was first introduced in German Masonry in 1926, well before the Nazi era, at the annual Communication of the Grand Lodge Zur Sonne, in Bremen, where it was distributed to all the participants. That was a terrible time in Germany, economically speaking, further aggravated in 1929 following that year’s Great Depression.

That economic situation, contributed to Hitler’s accession to power. Many people depended on charity, some of which was Masonic. Distributing the forget-me-not at the Grand Lodge Communication was meant to remind German Brethren of the charitable activities of the Grand Lodge.

In early 1934, it became evident that Freemasonry was in danger.  In that same year, the Grand Lodge of the Sun (one of the pre-war German Grand Lodges, located in Bayreuth) realising the grave dangers involved, adopted the little blue Forget Me Not flower as a substitute for the traditional square and compasses.

It was felt the flower would provide brethren with an outward means of identification while lessening the risk of possible recognition in public by the Nazis, who were engaged in wholesale confiscation of all Masonic Lodge properties. Freemasonry went undercover, and this delicate flower assumed its role as a symbol of Masonry surviving throughout the reign of darkness.

In 1936 the Winterhilfswerk (a non- Masonic winter charity drive) held a collection and used and distributed the same symbol, again with its obvious charitable connotation. Some of the Masons who remembered the 1926 Communication possibly also wore it later as a sign of recognition. We have no evidence of that and its general signification still was charity, but not specifically Masonic charity.

During the ensuing decade of Nazi power a little blue Forget Me Not flower worn in a Brother’s lapel served as one method whereby brethren could identify each other in public (although even then it was not always safe to wear any non-Nazi pin), and in cities and concentration camps throughout Europe. The Forget Me Not distinguished the lapels of countless brethren who staunchly refused to allow the symbolic Light of Masonry to be completely extinguished.

When the Grand Lodge of the Sun was reopened in Bayreuth in 1947, by Past Grand Master  Beyer, a little pin in the shape of a Forget Me Not was officially adopted as the emblem of that first annual convention of the brethren who had survived the bitter years of semi-darkness to rekindle the Masonic Light.

At the first Annual Convent of the new United Grand Lodges Of Germany AF&AM (VGLvD), in 1948 Bro. Theodor Vogel, Master of the Lodge “Zum weißen Gold am Kornberg”, in Selb (then in Western-occupied Germany), remembered the 1926 and 1936 pin, had a few hundred made and started handing it out as a Masonic symbol wherever he went. When Brother Vogel was later elected GM of the Grand Lodge AFuAM of Germany and visited a Grand Masters’ conference in Washington, DC, he distributed.

But is the story True?

Information about the Masonic tradition surrounding the blue forget me not amounts to very little. It is true that the flower was used by some German Masons about 1926, and it appears likely that in March 1938 some of them did wear it again as a Nazi badge, even though by an extraordinary coincidence, it had been chosen as a Masonic emblem twelve years earlier. It is likely not true that it was ever worn after March 1938 as a secret mean of recognition.

However, even if many German Masons (together with the great majority of German citizens of that time) never objected to the Nazi politics and went so far as to support Hitler, some were brave enough to fight him openly.

Based on the membership of all the then existing German Lodges, it is likely that around 1 or 2%. Out of the 174 Lodges which participated in the creation of the first United Grand Lodge of Germany, five only belonged to the Symbolical Grand Lodge of 1930, the only German Grand Lodge which resisted Hitler.

For human and political reasons as well, those Masons who thought it their duty to rebuild German Freemasonry once the War was over could hardly tell the whole truth to their foreign brethren. I personally believe they might have told the story of those dark years in a different way, but I am ready to admit that it is probably easier to say so in 2009 than it was in the 1950s.

Accordingly a legend was born. Not the legend of the forget-me-not, but that of a German Freemasonry too weak to resist, banned as soon as Hitler became Chancellor of the Reich, wearing a badge on the streets and – of all things ! – in concentration camps. That legend was likely born as the result of an unconscious effort to inhibit the past as well as a conscious manoeuvre. It was believed not only because it was the logical thing to do, but also because it was reassuring to imagine Freemasons acting according to their ideals, fighting for freedom and defending it.

Lets keep it at that and let us admit to the Masonic Brotherhood of the blue Forget Me Not  and thus did a simple flower blossom forth into a symbol of the fraternity, and become perhaps the most widely worn emblem among Freemasons in Germany.

In the years since adoption, its significance world-wide has been attested to by the tens of thousands of brethren who now display it with meaningful pride.

 

Photo: Steve Batiz
Story: Masonic Network