Several years ago in the movie Thor: Ragnarok, there’s a comment made by Odin to Thor,
Asgard is not a place
Later on Thor mentions it again, that Asgard is not a place, it’s the people.
Think about that for a moment, it’s not where they are located, it’s not what they own, it’s who they are.
It’s also something that I think many Freemasons have lost site of.
How many times have you sat in a meeting, grabbed a cup of coffee with a Brother, and talked about the various challenges of a Lodge?
I will lay odds that the conversation rapidly turns to issues related to the possessions of the Lodge, or the building, or any one of a hundred other topics, but not the Brothers.
The Lodge is not the building.
It’s the Brethren.
A Masonic Lodge is not the building, it’s the Brethren, regardless of where they meet. When asked about your Lodge the first thoughts and comments should be about your Brethren, not about the building. We don’t need a building to meet, in fact, I feel that often more masonry is practiced in the time before and after a meeting than during it – when you actually interact with the Brethren and stop worrying about “the business” of the Lodge.
It’s just something to consider the next time you start discussing Lodge challenges.