A HAPPY NEW YEAR TO ALL BRETHREN.
Well there is a lot going on if the postings on the website from sonofthewidow are to be believed. This person has now signed himself Senior Grand Warden. Does that mean it is .....well I'm not actually too sure who the Senior Grand Warden is this month. Is it Graham Flint yet?
Personally I reckon sonofthewidow is nothing but a mischief maker.
To put you all straight on this rumour that GL are putting around to take the focus away from the 50.000 € of the stolen money allegedly due back on the 15th of January 2010.
Norbert Schoen has been purchasing a variety of items from me on Ebay. All of these items are my own personal property and mine to sell. He has spent a considerable amount of money. Recently he has given me bad feedback on ebay and made untrue remarks about the status of the items I am selling. Of course he has no idea but these comments were there for everyone to see. I asked him to remove them but he wouldn't so I put him on a black list making it impossible for him to bid on my items. He then got his girl friend to bid on items and I then had to black list her too. Then he got a brother in UK to bid on items. It seemed to me that there was mileage in making Norbert Schoen an offer for him to be able to purchase all the items I had for a one off advantageous price. He immediately showed interest but, and I hadn't really expected anything different, he said the deal should include my PJGW regalia and certificates, closing down my website, admitting I was no longer a Mason and having no further contact with GL Members., in other words I should just go away forever! Initially I told him that this could not be the deal as I needed my regalia when I went to lodges(which I continue to do) and my website was a necessary tool to enable brethren who normally would have no such outlet, to air their Masonic views and remain anonymous! So far so good. He didn't reply to this email.
After having had my health problems with the Bypass operation etc. I decided that it still might be advantageous for the Grand Lodge of British Freemasons in Germany to put an end to all of this mess it had got itself into and perhaps even save the organisation from the disintegration it is surely heading for. For whatever reason I really believed that they would be very keen to make all of this business disappear once and for all. I contacted Norbert and told him that I would be prepared, mainly due to a change in my personal priorities, to re-address the suggestion he had initially made to me.
It must be born in mind that the GL has already budgeted the sum of 2.000 € per year for the next three years for legal costs. Norbert has been purchasing a great deal of items from me on ebay and I have it on very good authority that the money to pay for these items just might be coming from GL funds. The obvious harm the hierarchy of GL feel that this website is causing them and most importantly, the very bad effect this whole business is having within the United Grand Lodges of Germany and foreign Grand Lodges, causing damage which will eventually cost the GLBFG dearly., was all surely reason enough to want to resolve the situation. In view of all of this I was certain that by re-addressing Norberts suggestion I would find some basis for a final solution to the problem.
I should have known that Norbert Schoen could not be trusted. I should have realised that they would twist the whole matter and try and make me out to be some kind of international gangster! I actually did think that they might be interested in clearing the whole thing up, but no I am afraid this appears clearly not to be the case. Recently somebody sent me a copy of the Forget Me Not Lodge Summons in Dortmund with me down on the list as an Honorary Member. Such are the methods these people are now using to throw confusuion into the pot. You couldn't make it up.
It was really an opportunity after swapping the illegally elected and intellectually challenged Fred Colbran for Barrie Gibson as Grand Master to draw a line and using our Masonic principles, to address and solve the problems the Grand Lodge has been under for almost 10 years now!
His actions and behaviour to date have not given much cause for hope however. I still did think that Barrie Gibson could do something but a recently sent out email from him to many of us Grand Officers led me and I am sure many others, to cast much doubt on his state of mind.
I will leave it for you all to make your own decisions. Here is a completely unedited copy of what Barrie wrote;
From: barrie.gibson@t-online.de
Its that time of year again, a time for reflection and resolution As usual, the resolutions come thick and fast - learn a new language, skill, or talent free the mind using yoga, destressors, or eating funny foods optimistically hoping to give something back, or going greener (is optimistically a word?) Create a wealth plan! Its the sameO, sameO only differing in failure level depending on where I run out of effort, commitment or enthusiasm. That said it would not be that time of the year if we did not pretend this time is going to be different. The reflection hurts more because with 20/20 hindsight you realise you have not paid attention to those things that are important. That's a pity for time, like first impressions, can never be revisited. Enough navel gazing!! how are you ? How are the Families? what are your plans for 2010 (already someone is suggesting we call the decade the "teenys") Ugh! Ugh! the "noughties" annoyed me as it was always a phrase Kenneth Williams (Carry on Films) would use. The "teanys" make me feel old. I'v been known to be wrong! my Family is well, Be and I are hibernating for Hogmannay. How else would I get my resolutions done? Whatever you are doing, enjoy! and especially at this time of year I remember an Irish ditty that seems appropriate.
It is quoted for You!
May the road rise up to meet you.
May the wind be always at your back. May the sun shine warm on your face. and until we meet again, may God hold you in the palm of his hand.
Warmest regards
Barrie &
Be
I don't know about all of you but this doesn't appear to have been written by someone who is in touch with reality, but I could be wrong. What do you think? Is this the kind of correspondence you would expect from a Grand Master?
Have a great 2010 and don't forget there are only 11 days to go until the 50.000 € comes back to David Smiths Grand Lodge bank account, according to John Hebel anyway!
REGULATIONS?
It won't have escaped you all that we seem to have steered away from printed versions of Grand Lodge Regulations. The argument will surely be that it is easier to have an online version, more easily distributed, cheaper etc. etc. In theory all of these are correct. When you have online regulations however, they are also easier to change. At a stroke, in fact. I have just read the most recent edition of the GL Regs. I urge you all to have a look at Regulation Number 2. After doing so, consult both your Boards Representative and the minutes from recent Boards Meetings and see if you can get to the bottom of when this changed No.2 Regulation was actually changed. It has to do with German Law pertaining to registered association, the infamous e.V. This type of association is not preferred by our leaders as it enables a lodge to have the protection of the German Law pertaining to Associations against the corruptive "management" of the Grand Lodge of British Freemasons in Germany. This is nothing at all to do with any kind of Masonic Regularity, it only has to do with power, control and money. The power the Masonic hierarchy need to feed their egos, the control required to prevent anybody doing anything to wrestle the power from them and the money that is obviously freely available to a handful of our leaders who, having bred a culture who appear to think that all GL money is theirs for the taking, are taking it.
I am truly amazed that the silent majority of our members just seem to accept this.
TOMORROW THE 50.000 € COMES BACK FROM THE FORD MOTOR COMPANY UNAUTHORISED SHARE DEAL. Let's see what happens shallwe? Don't forget to keep asking your Boards Representative though! It is a completely justified question. You just ask "Can you request written confirmation from the President of the Boards and Grand Treasurer that the 50.000 € has arrived on David Smith's bank account?"
You will all realise that the Grand Lodge doesn't have a German Bank Account. That is not possible. It is in the name of the Grand Treasurer. This is a very dangerous situation and one I have been campaigning against for years now. If anything happened to David Smith(God forbid) then any money on a bank account in his name would go to his estate. Imagine if businesses were run in this way. We'd never be out of court.
Speaking of court, the ongoing case brought by me against the GL is just that:-ongoing. I hope to have more information soon as there have been some incredibly interesting court judgements inside the EU with regards to Freemasonry and in particular, the power a Grand Master has or has not! Watch this space.
JK.
Well there hasn't been any announcement regarding the Ford Motor Company money-I wonder why not. Just to remind you all- This kind of gross misappropriation of YOUR money could easily happen again in spite of what you have been told. The monies of the Grand Lodge are held in the accounts of the Grand Treasurer in Germany. It isn't possible for the Grand Lodge to hold German Bank Accounts in it's own name as it does not have the required legal status. I have been harping on about this for years. The main reason why the leadership do not want to go down the road of changing the GL into a registered association in accordance with the laws of Germany is easily explained. Presently there is nothing in place to prevent the Grand Treasurer doing whatever the Grand Master tells him to do with GL Funds. The Board of General Purposes has proved itself to be totally ineffective due to unilateral changes to the regulations resulting in the Boards having little or no say in the running of Grand Lodge. Can you imagine what would happen if the Grand Treasurer took all the money and ran? Hardly likely you think, but isn't the taking of 53.000€ without permission and giving it to an individual to invest in highly volitle stocks & shares almost as bad? It highlights just how precarious the safety of Grand Lodge funds are. I cannot understand why the leadership of any similar organisation to ours wouldn't want complete transparancy and in particular, democratic controls in place where such large amounts of money are concerned. Surely they wouldn't want a situation where any fingers could point at them in the case of irregularities would they? Well that is exactly what we have got. It will surely take the illegal and irrevocable removal of all of the money from GL to make some people understand that this is not a situation we can live with any longer. There have been cases in the past where monies have been taken from lodges, in one case twice from one particular lodge. There was also the Beaver fiasco where John Woodhouse unsuccessfully conspired to have me thrown out of Beaver Lodge by attempting to have me accused of taking money. Fortunately for me and unfortunately for him, I am not one to just sit around and take it and after a succesful court case against Beaver Lodge I was able to have all accusations and charges completely dropped and a so-called "expulsion" overturned by the judge. If any of you are interested, this is all fully documented on this site. Had Beaver Lodge not have been a registered association, I would not have been able to bring such a case against them in a court of law. Remarkably, since losing the court case, Beaver has closed down as a registered association and is now in the same situation as the GL insofar as the Treasurer has the lodge's money in his own account. Not a very sound idea in my view. There are other legal questions which need answering with regard to this switchaway from official registered association. The money left in accounts after such a dissolution of the registered association MUST be looked after by a board of trustees and thereafter as prescribed in the articles of association, all be transferred to the Freimauriches Hilfswek e.V. the official German Registered Charity. This has not been done. The whole Beaver episode was a disgrace and again showed how the future of a lodge means nothing to GL hierarchy when defending their self appointed "right" to use Masonry and it's money to finance a certain lifestyle.
There are of course a great many brethren who do not agree with me. On a closer analysis however, it can be stated with a large amount of certainty that these brethren are either Grand Officers or expecting to be made a Grand Officer quite soon and eagerly tow the "party line".
For my part, I am saddened that there are so many brethren to whom getting up the ladder of promotion means so much. It is truly ironic that it is mainly these brethren who accuse me of the same attachment to my Grand Rank that they show. They misunderstand however. I have never tried to attain any Grand Rank at all. The fact is that when I was informed that John Woodhouse wanted to make me a Past Junior Grand Warden 10 years ago, I respectfully declined, preferring to wait and take whatever Past Grand Rank equated to the last Grand Office I held. In my case, I was the Junior Grand Warden and therefore it is my right to hold the title of Past Junior Grand Warden. Prior to this I always called myself a Past Grand Secretary as that was the highest office I had previously attained. Never would I have accepted PJGW as a gift just for being Grand Secretary or Grand Treasurer. In the last 10 years the honour and significance of becoming an appointed Past Junior Grand Warden has fallen to the floor. I am still the only current Past Junior Grand Warden who holds that rank because he was Junior Grand Warden. It has nothing to do with any desperation on my part to cling onto my dark blue. I will remain a Past Junior Grand Warden of the Grand Lodge of British Freemasons in Germany for life-that is simply an historical fact. I recognise that the intellect of many anonymous contributors to my guestbook anf forum pages do not share this view, but as indicated, this is more due to a considerable lack of knowledge(not just Masonic) rather than being based on any kind of sound foundation.
NEW GERMAN SPEAKING LODGE(S)
The somewhat incredulous idea that the GLBFG should have German speaking lodges in it must go down as the summit of stupidity and those who are attempting to make this happen will go down in history as revolutionaries who were responsible for the begining of the break-up of the GLBFG. Our Grand Lodge is only here to serve the purpose of providing English(Scottish) Freemasonry to the British community(mainly military and attached civilians and retirees) in Germany. Up until 1979 we only needed 14 lodges in order to do this and even then many were only continuing to exist due to many brethren having multiple memberships. The Lodge in Munich was different. It was in an area where there were no British Forces but a very large cosmopolitan English speaking community and therefore it was a sensible decision to form Southern Star. Now, what with the attempted reformation of New Absalom Lodge in Gütersloh(I know, isn't it ridiculous?) we are more than in danger of diluting our already streched membership(Shiny MacKinnon is the D of C in FOUR Lodges!) They will never learn.
SATURDAY'S MOBILISATION
The members of the Keys of Münster are already mobilising for the return of yours truly to the lodge this Saturday. As many of you are already aware, I am still a member of my mother lodge, Keys of Münster, the membership of which have been threatened with allsorts by Grand Lodge if any of them even speak to me. This is all illegal and as I have the German law on my side I though a visit to the Installation meeting on Saturday might be interesting. Those who rely on the anonyminity afforded them on my Guestbook and Forum in order to criticise me will no doubt be pleased to know that unlike the GL Meeting where I sat outside and yes, I did read my newspaper, this time will be different. I urge you all to attrend as it will certainly not just be an "ordinary" meeting. Look forward to seeing many of you.
CRITICISM
As stated above, many of you have seen fit to criticise me on both my Guestbook and Forum. That is of course, your good right and I have prevented the GL from taking any action against you by allowing postings to be anonymous. This, in turn, has unfortunately left the door open for rather ill thought out comments from many subscribers over recent months which is really sad. However, as you will also know, the GL has allowed Dr. Olivers famous saying printed on most summons, to go unheeded over the last decade, resulting in some very unsuitable and very unsavoury characters haveing been allowed to join our association. This is really exactly what Dr. Oliver warns against, but in the desperate drive for new members and thereby increased cash-flow to pay for and support our GL hierarchy, proper controls have been ignored. We have Grand Officers in our midst who would definitely have a job even getting into a lodge in some parts of Britain and as our leadership is hell-bent on allowing these brethren to go travelling around the UK, our good reputation, which had been built up by hard work hroughout the 50's up to the 90's, is now on the floor. When we allow our organisation to be run by individuals who, in many cases, cannot string two coherant sentences together and whose Masonic knowledge can be written on the back of a very small stamp, it really is no wonder that standards drop and reputations are shredded.
So what does GL do in order to reverse this negative trend? Well, nothing is the answer and why should they? It cannot be considered a positive development(from their point of view) to allow clever individuals with a grasp of the true aim of Freemasonry amongst their midst. This would bring with it a certain amount of enlightenment resulting in brethren asking more questions about the direction this organisation is going in. Presently it is going down and it is only a question of how long before the goings-on within GL become a subject for deep discussion within the United Grand Lodges of Germany, particularly the Senate. It is obvious that GL AFAM are not happy about the development of introducing German speaking lodges into GLBFG. The argument that GL AF &AM have now introduced an English speaking lodge and so why can't GLBFG have a German speaking one is of no substance. We were initially formed to accomodate the British Forces and their dependants and support staff. We were never there to open German speaking lodges. In the begining it was truly magnanimous of German Freemasonry to allow us to establish ourselves at all. With hindsight there are many German Masons who see the existance of GLBFG and the ACGL as a stumbling block to a unified single Grand Lodge in Germany, spearheaded by GL AF & AM. The present situation whereby the two aforementioned Grand Lodges have a disproportionate voice in Senate matters just cannot continue. It is not in the interests of the future development of German Freemasonry to allow the present system to continue forever. Things will have to change.
AMAZING RECOVERY
As I have been out of hospital/Clinic now for just over a month, you will all be pleased to know(no doubt!) that I am well on the road to complete and full recovery. I feel I have been extremely lucky to have had the type of medical treatment available here in Germany and I watch TV and see the standards of medicine in other parts of the weorld and it almost brings me to tears.
Wouldn't it be nice if we could focus our charitable activities on an organisation like Médecins Sans Frontières
Have a look by clicking on the link.
WELCOME BACK LARRY
It was with great pleasure that I learned of the return to Germany of my old friend and brother Larry Jones to whom I spoke on the telephone today. It will be a great pleasure meeting up with him soon.
Wij kunen zeker de heele dag alleen nederlands spreken Larry maar als't te veel woord voor jou(boven de 60 weet je?) gaat dat ook in het engelse tal.
MORE BLOG THIS WEEK
I have had to remove some entries from the Guest Book. This is most unfortunate for two reasons. Firstly, some contributors obviously had points to make but because of their use of abusive, obscene and in one case, illegal language, their thoughts and views are now not available to us. Should they wish to repeat them in a more tempered manner tI would allow it to remain and then we can all partake of their knowledge and views. Secondly, and perhaps most disturbing, is the fact that these contributors are members of the Grand Lodge of British Freemasons in Germany. Some of them are senior members! I am constantly being popped at for my criticism of the standard of many of our members of Grand Lodge, but when you see the kind of illegal and abusive filth that these "brethren" write, then I must be close to saintdom by now. I won't allow it. I am constantly getting flak from these people that some of my actions have not been "Masonic". After receiving the above mentioned entries on the guestbook I can only confirm that my feelings that these individuals did not deserve to be Freemasons have been proven to be right. Thoroughly disgraceful! One of the deleted entries even included a threat to engage a lawyer and get this website closed down. I have left this particular person my own special message on the guestbook which I urge you all to have a look at. If this person persists he will be in serious trouble. You cannot carry on in such a manner just because you don't like what is written here. What you do is respond by writing well laid out and well thought out arguments. Unfortunately, this is beyond the intelligence of those who resort to illegal verbal tirades and unecessary obscenities. Unless they are capable of writing in an acceptable manner they will get no forum from me on which to spread their muck!
I personally believe that these people have been encouraged to behave in this manner by the hierarchy of Grand Lodge in order to besmerch this website!
