Crowle’s Vermuyden Lodge worked a ‘Lodge of Sorrow’ at its November meeting, recalling brethren who passed to the Grand Lodge above during the pandemic.
It was a particularly poignant ceremony, with aprons of the departed brethren occupying places in the Lodge room and their names being met with a silent response when all Vermuyden Brethren were asked individually to declare their attendance.
The departed Brethrens’ aprons were then paraded around the lodge building before being passed out of the Lodge to the Tyler, symbolising their exit to the Grand Lodge Above.
Vermuyden members remembered in this way were three founders and the Lodge’s first initiate:
W Bro Colin Crofts
W Bro John Cundall PJGD
W Bro Peter West
W Bro Jerry Beck
Brethren from other Crowle Lodges were also remembered. The Lodge’s WM Andy Urry said: “The pandemic placed us, and all Lodges, in a particularly difficult position when members passed to the Grand Lodge Above. Although we were prevented from remembering them during the lockdown, we felt we couldn’t allow their passing to slip by unnoticed.
“We felt a Lodge of Sorrow was the best way to pay tribute to them and their Masonic careers, and so it proved. It was a particularly poignant and moving evening with 55 Brethren attending from 17 lodges.”