As the Masonic year is coming to a close, Friendship still found the time to make a sixth Entered Apprentice this year last night when Jonathan joined our ranks. It was a great way to wrap up the year of Masonic degrees with our team in wonderful form. One of the highlights of the evening was having two of our most recent EAs get to watch another Brother receive their first degree, and hearing them discussing their Masonic journeys together.
Friendship held our last Stated business meeting of the year last night. We started the night with a delicious meal of Thai food provided by our Brother Junior Warden Kyle as his final dinner for the year before moving onto our business. Much to the Brothers approval, it was the shortest business meeting of 2025 as we look towards transferring into the next Masonic year. The Brothers held a moment of silence for the passing for Brother Bill Korte whose funeral we are in the process of planning. For education, we listened to a poem by Montford C. Holley called, “The Work”:
The gavel sounds and all is still:
The Master speaks, proclaims his will:
Each one obeys, takes up his tools.
Inspects the plan, consults the rules:
With trowel and level, plumb and square,
Each stone is set exactly where
The plan provides, the drawing shows
And day by day, the Temple grows:
The porch is finished, pillars placed
The strands of net-work, interlaced
The chambers furnished, pavement laid,
The sacred vessels all displayed:
The walls are standing, straight and true
The roof is on, the labor through:
The Master speaks, The work is done:
The gavel sounds, God calls us home
Friendship continues to bolster our numbers as we welcomed Rob into the Lodge, our fifth Entered Apprentice this year. Rob has been quite patient, waiting a few months now since turning in his petition because the Lodge has been so busy catching up with al the petitions we’ve received over the year. We also are in debt to Brother Derek from Kenton #145, who saved us by performing the Lecture at the last second after Walter was injured while riding his bike.
Friendship met on a rather rainy Wednesday this month for our November Stated Meeting. We enjoyed a delicious dinner of comfort food from Screen Door which fit very well with the weather. After dinner we retired to the Lodge for one of the longest, but one of the most productive business meetings of the year. We balloted on two candidates to receive the degrees of Masonry, and both ballots came back positive! So we’ll be initiating two Brothers, Rob and Jonathan, in the next two months.
We paused in our many votes to confirm Matt’s proficiency in the Master Mason degree, before officially appointing him Senior Steward in recognition of the role he’s been pro-teming for months now. We were all so excited, noone noticed he wore two aprons for the rest of the meeting! The voting continued with the elections of our 2026 Officers, which all occurred harmoniously. Another wonderful meeting for Friendship!
Friendship continues to have an amazing year of initiations as we welcomed Sandy, our fourth EA of 2025 this week. We welcomed guests from Beaverton Masonic and Multnomah Lodges as we exemplified our ritual and brought our newest Brother into the Fraternity. Afterwards we retired to our Clubhouse and enjoyed Pizza and words of wisdom for our newest Brother.
We had a lovely Stated Meeting on Wednesday, with a visit from our new District Deputy Blake! After enjoying some a succulent Chinese meal upstairs, we went to the Lodge for business. In a delightful surprise, our Brothers at Kenton Lodge showed up in force and brought enough guests to borrow a gavel from us!
We had a lovely evening over at the Washington Temple with Willamette and Fairview Lodges! We held a joint meeting, so all three Lodges were opened at once. All in all we had 52 Masons assembled and in attendance! Even the Grand Master came to make an appearance! It was a great time for all, special thanks to Fairview for providing the delicious food.
Just because we’re dark for the summer, that doesn’t mean the work has finished! Last week we had a privilege of putting on a courtesy Master Mason degree for Wasco #15. We had a wonderful evening enjoying the degree and fellowship with Brothers from at least 7 different Lodges from around the Metro area and the Gorge. A huge credit to WB Dale without whom the degree couldn’t have happened.
We had a lovely time this weekend at Liberty and Hamburgers, our yearly Fourth of July celebration. There were delicious hamburgers, and brats from Gartners and everybody ate their fill! It was a very hot day, but luckily we kept cool and enjoyed some fellowship late into the night. The brethren also surprised our Worshipful Master with a hand made Mjolnir style gavel, which is fast becoming a yearly tradition at our BBQ!
We are having a wonderful year for membership, much to our overwhelming pride. This week, we initiated our newest Brother Justin into our fraternity. We have gotten fairly well practiced with the Entered Apprentice degree this year, so everything went off perfectly. We moved downstairs to enjoy our pizza and had a lovely discussion about what being a Mason means to us all.
