MSA Disaster Relief Appeal: Venezuela Earthquake

by Christopher Hodapp

The following urgent disaster appeal was sent out today by Mark Tabbert, Administrator of the Masonic Service Association of North America:

Photo: UPI

Venezuela Earthquake Disaster Relief Appeal

On 24 June 2026 two large earthquakes struck northwestern and central Venezuela, both centered in San Felipe, Yaracur. Currently hundreds of thousands are homeless, more than 5,000 were killed at least 16,500 are injured, and tens of thousands remain missing.

As of 17 July, at least five brother Masons with 300 relatives of brothers were also killed. Thousands more have lost their homes, their livelihoods, their worldly possessions. Lastly, the Grand Lodge Temple in Caracas, built in 1873, was severely damaged.

As Brothers of the Craft, let us remember that adversity only strengthens our international bonds.

Let us also use this moment to reflect on the fragility of life and the importance of being prepared, not just physically, but also in terms of the support systems we offer to one another.

José Gregorio Sardelli Bravo Grand Master Grand Lodge of the Republic of Venezuela has requested the Masonic Service Association of North America (MSA) to issue this Disaster Relief Appeal. The MSANA Board of Commissioners has endorsed this request.

If you choose to give to this appeal please forward any donations you feel appropriate to help our devastated Brothers and their families in this stricken grand jurisdiction to MSANA.

Please make checks payable to MSA Disaster Relief Appeal and mail to:

Masonic Service Association
813 1st Avenue SE, Suite 357
Cedar Rapids, IA 52402

ONLINE DONATIONS : https://msana.com/current-appeals/

When remitting by check, please clearly mark that you wish the funds to go to the Venezuela Earthquake Relief Appeal.

Sincerely, 

Mark A. Tabbert, PM

Administrator

Masonic Service Association of North America 

The 1873 Grand Lodge building in Caracas, Venezuela before the earthquake

Main temple in the Grand Lodge building in Caracas, Venezuela

The Masonic Service Association is usually the best and most effective way to provide financial assistance to Masons in disaster-stricken areas. 

If you are new to the fraternity or have never heard of the MSANA, it is a legitimate 501(c)(3) charitable organization. That is important to remember, especially if you, your company, or foundation are making a large donation and are in need of a tax deduction in return. The charitable arm of the Masonic Service Association was specifically established for the purpose of raising tax deductible donations, and to effectively distribute and account for the funds provided to Masons who receive assistance. Your entire donation will be sent to the affected jurisdiction. MSA deducts nothing for administrative expenses or expenses of any kind. Meaning if you donate $100.00, all $100.00 gets to the specific grand lodge issuing the appeal.

MSANA appeals are always done at the specific request of an affected Masonic jurisdiction when a catastrophe strikes. When donating through an MSA appeal you can be sure the money is officially going directly to the jurisdiction that requested it, which may not always be the case with a GoFundMe appeal or similar services. GoFundMe donations are not by law tax deductible because the IRS has no way of knowing how the money was raised, how it was spent, what may have been promised or given in return, and no way of peering into the accounting of whomever set it up. The IRS has very strict rules about tax deductible charities, and GoFundMe-type services don't even attempt to comply. And even if a legitimate lodge or grand lodge sets up such an appeal through GoFundMe, they can't issue a legit 501(c)(3) deduction to the donors unless they have their own charitable foundation or corporation that already does comply with the IRS. 

July 18: Speaking at Ohio Masonic Education Event This Saturday

by Christopher Hodapp

I'll be speaking this Saturday, July 18th at Ohio's 6th Masonic District's Pillars of Knowledge event. This Masonic educational gathering will be held at J.B. Covert Lodge No. 437 on the east side of Cincinnati, Ohio, between 8AM and 3PM.

Six speakers will be featured:

• Chris Hodapp (Dummy)
• Dan Hrinko (author of 'The Craft Driven Lodge')
• William Carter III (PGM and Cybersecurity Expert)
• Dirk Hughes (Director of the Michigan Masonic Museum and Library)
• Tim Redick (Associate Dean off the Royal Schofield Society)
• Michael Miller ((Master of the Ohio Lodge of Research)

Registration is $30 and lunch is included.  Visit the website HERE to register. 

(Not enough time to pre-register? Any Master Mason is welcome to attend and registrations will also be held onsite beginning at 8AM)

The lodge is located at 848 Clough Pike, Cincinnati, OH 45245. 

Break-In and Arson at Pennsylvania Shrine Center

by Christopher Hodapp

A 72-year old man has been arrested for setting fire to a Shrine Center in Altoona, Pennsylvania, causing well over $130,000 in damages.

This site is sadly becoming a repository for stories of vandalism against the fraternity.

James Kaufman, 72

According to local TV station WTAJ, James Kaufman (photo) was said by local authorities to have been undergoing a 'mental health crisis" and believed his daughter was being held inside Altoona's enormous Jaffa Shrine Center against her will. Early Tuesday morning, he broke inside and began busting windows and destroying furniture. Neighbors heard the noise and called police. Kaufman had obviously come prepared and apparently spent some time in the building, as investigators found Shrine items in his car.  They discovered kerosene had been spread and set alight in the main arena and auditorium. 

Kaufman is charged with Risking a Catastrophe, Arson, Burglary and many associated charges. Thankfully, no one was injured in the incident.

This may very well just be an unfortunate man suffering from dementia or Alzheimer's. But it would be unwise to ignore the possibility of a deliberate anti-Masonic attack. The recent increase in these kinds of incidents - and worse - throughout North America over the last couple of years needs to be brought attention to local police. Local law enforcement may not always be aware that Masons and Shriners are on a growing number of hit lists of paranoids, Jew-haters, or zealous religious fanatics who think we're devil worshipers, and worse. If your Masonic hall or Shrine center is attacked, be sure to alert investigators as to the dangers of these nuts.

GL of Scotland Joins Britain's Council of Freemasonry To Fight Anti-Masonry

by Christopher Hodapp

The male-only Grand Lodge of Scotland has joined with the United Grand Lodge of England and England's female Freemasons in a cooperative organization to address urgent contemporary issues facing the fraternity at large. The Council of Freemasonry was established in 2024 as a cooperative organization and now represents most of the Masons, male and female, in Great Britain when it comes to certain public matters. The purpose is for Britain's Masons to publicly speak with one united voice on matters that concern them all.

In Monday's The Herald, it was reported:

The [Council of Freemasonry] includes the United Grand Lodge of England (UGLE), the Order of Women Freemasons (OWF), the Honourable Fraternity of Ancient Freemasons (HFAF), and now the Grand Lodge of Scotland.

Created in 2024, the council aims to strengthen collaboration between the organisations while promoting shared values including integrity, friendship, respect and service.

Its work focuses on public engagement, charitable projects, membership growth and challenging outdated perceptions of Freemasonry.

The inclusion of Scotland means the council now represents Freemasonry across the whole of Great Britain.

The article mistakenly calls the Council a 'governing' body, which it is not. It was formed two years ago, specifically in the face of anti-Masonic press coverage and a growing anti-Masonic sentiment within law enforcement. A recent rule passed by the London Metropolitan Police dramatically encroaches on the privacy of Masons on the force, requiring officers to publicly state their current or prior Masonic membership. Such rules were found to be discriminatory by the European Court of Human Rights almost 20 years ago, but English courts see no fault with them. 

The MET's new policy singles out the Freemasons as the sole organization in which officers must declare their membership. Worse, it classifies Masonic membership as a "declarable association, along with criminal convictions, those who have been dismissed from policing, and lawful professions such as private investigation or journalism."

Branding certain cops as Masons now opens officers up to completely unfounded allegations that they might somehow engage in funny business like cronyism, letting off 'brother' criminals or ignoring 'brother' officers' bad behavior, promoting Masonic officers over non-Masons, or looking the other way in cases strictly because they might sit in lodge together.

Despite decades of investigating the purported role of secret Masonic membership in high profile police cases, there has never been a proven incident tied to the Freemasons. Tons of allegations and millions of pounds expended hunting dirty Masons under the bedclothes, but never a shred of evidence. But that hasn't stopped other disgruntled cops and sensationalistic news outlets from falsely alleging all sorts of nefarious behavior among Masons in law enforcement ever since the 1980s.

The Council for Freemasonry announced its purpose in 2024 when it was formed:

The establishment of the Council for Freemasonry will formally establish an overarching forum for collaboration. In addition, the Council will bring together the community service ambitions of all three bodies, coordinate communication and engagement with other organisations, drive the membership growth ambitions, particularly for women Freemasons, and allocate resources and facilities for the general benefit of both male and female Freemasonry.

The Council will include the heads of each Grand Lodge, and each Grand Lodge will provide the President for a twelve-month period, chairing Council meetings in strict rotation. The President for the first two years will come from the OWF and HFAF, with UGLE covering the third year. 

The formation of the Council for Freemasonry in England and Wales marks a pivotal step towards enhancing cooperation, addressing misconceptions, and promoting the values of Freemasonry. This historic initiative reaffirms Freemasonry’s commitment to integrity, friendship, respect and service, while keeping community service and charitable giving at the absolute forefront of this historic organisation.

For those who might fret about such an announcement, none of this affects the regularity nor the recognition status of either the UGLE or the Grand lodge of Scotland as male-only Masonic fraternities. It should be remembered by U.S. Masons that Freemasonry in Britain and Europe , along with many other parts of the world, face challenges and biases of which we are blissfully unaware here. One of the primary jobs of the Council for Freemasonry is to counter public misinformation and press attacks against the fraternity by spreading the message that English Freemasonry is NOT just for men; that male and female Masonic organizations coexist, and are all alive and well and open for membership; and that none of these three grand lodges in Britain have any desire, intention, or reason for changing their practices or ideology of being a sanctuary from the outside world for their particular members, male or female.

Ontario Masonic Hall Vandalized With Anti-Masonic Graffiti

by Christopher Hodapp

Authorities in Burlington, Ontario are seeking information regarding an unknown tagger who vandalized the local Masonic hall Sunday early morning by spray painting a phony Albert Pike 'Luciferian' quotation on the side of the building.

From the BurlingtonToday.com website today:

On the wall of the building that faces Maria Street, an unknown tagger left a message for the group that some believe to have powerful connections.

“The doctrine of Freemasonry is to be maintained in the Luciferian doctrine at high degrees,” the graffiti reads, crediting the words to Albert Pike, a 19th century American poet and lawyer who was also a Mason. The graffiti also suggests that Pike predicted the World Wars. . .

These bogus lines are widely circulated on the Intertubz and falsely attributed to Pike. They are, in fact, taken directly from the infamous 'Taxil Hoax' perpetrated by 'Leo Taxil' (whose real name was Marie Joseph Gabriel Antoine Jogand-Pagès), a rabid French anti-Catholic and anti-Mason in the late 19th century. Taxil made a tidy profit peddling propaganda about the Masons for many years. 

Taxil singlehandedly invented the whole 'Luciferian Freemasonry' fable and gleefully went on to later admit it was all a hoax in a very public appearance on April 19, 1897. (For what it's worth, Albert Pike wrote precisely one passage in Morals & Dogma that explained the origin of the name 'Lucifer' and how it came to be attributed to 'Satan" over the centuries.) 

The truth about Taxil's hoax has been quite openly known for 130 years, but that hasn't stopped its wide dissemination on the web since the 1980s and 90s. Meanwhile, Pike's so-called 'world wars' prediction is a more relatively recent addition to the anti-Masonic repertoire and is a complete fabrication. It's not true, either. (For more details about Taxil and his hoax, see Tall Tales of Leo Taxil HERE)

The story continues:

Halton Regional Police told BurlingtonToday that the suspect was observed at 3:05 a.m. (July 5) with spray paint, and is described as a white man, medium build, wearing a straw cowboy hat, a dark jacket, white tee shirt, and shorts. He was also riding a bicycle.

VandenBerg said this is not the first time that the building has been tagged, but it is the first time to his knowledge that the Masons were specifically targeted in the message.

“We have been tagged before but that has been just generic graffiti that could have happened anywhere,” he said.

Documents and sacred texts have been dropped in the lodge mailbox, even being laminated at times, VanderBerg said, including an encyclopedia of Jewish texts that was left at the back door of the building. The building has been egged, and many more instances of vandalism came to mind for VandenBerg.

He added that the group added a stone marker to the outside of the building which has been urinated on previously, but he is unsure if that was related to the organization.

“Maybe it was the same person,” he said. “Maybe that was the first thing they did and now they are back to spray paint the building a few months later.”

Despite the long history of Burlington Masons' commitment to serving their community and contributing to local charities, this is the sort of idiotic attack that sometimes discourages lodges from being more public faced. And as we've seen in recent years, certain extremely unhinged anti-Masonic zealots are known to escalate their attacks on members and lodge halls. The McAllen Lodge incident in Texas is a horrifying example of what can happen when anti-Masons taken their paranoid hatred to the worst extremes.

If your lodge is vandalized in any way, especially if you suspect the motive was anti-Masonic in nature, you should report it immediately to local authorities. Attacks against Masons and lodges need to be on the radar screen for police and well documented because, as we've seen, the true nuts are sometimes fully capable and motivated to come back again.

Anti-Masonic Texas Murder Suspect Charged with More Arson Attempts

by Christopher Hodapp

Julio Diaz, currently awaiting trial in the murder of a Freemason outside of a Texas Masonic hall, along with prior incidents of damaging that same lodge building, has just been charged in two more arson attacks against a different lodge.

Diaz is accused of shooting WB Robert Wise outside of McAllen Lodge 1110 in southern Texas following an officer's installation on July 10, 2023. He is also accused of attempting to set fire to that building in 2022.

Llano Grande Lodge in Westlaco, TX (Google Earth photo)

According to KRGV-TV5, Hidalgo County authorities have now brought more charges against Diaz regarding two additional arson attempts in February 2023 at the Welasco Masonic temple, located about 20 miles east of McAllen. The Welasco hall is home to Llano Grande Lodge 1173.

Fire damage in 2023. (KRGV-TV5)

After his initial arrest, sources familiar with the investigation said that Diaz believed Masons are "devil worshiping Illuminatists." A Facebook commenter said Diaz had previously posted anti-Masonic comments on social media, claiming the lodge "had put a curse on him."

In April, the judge in the case expressed frustration with Diaz' defense attorney regarding the numerous delays they've requested since his initial court appearance. His tentative trial date is now in early August, but they may request additional time now that these new charges have been brought.

Detroit Masonic Temple Library Booted From the Biggest Temple in the World

by Christopher Hodapp

The trustees and management of the massive Detroit Masonic Temple have evicted the Detroit Masonic Temple Library from the building. The 10,000-volume library has been in the building since it was opened a hundred years ago, and in recent years they have also organized and operated the popular tours of the landmark building. 

I find it hard to believe that the Temple Association couldn't accommodate the Library somewhere with its 1,000 (mostly unoccupied) rooms and over a 550,000 square feet of space. It's almost unbelievable for the Temple Association to find no way to keep this precious resource in this amazing structure. It is the largest Masonic building in the world, so I'm speculating that there were other reasons besides crowding. Possibly money; possibly some unannounced plan to redevelop the building (how many times have I heard THAT one up there?); possibly a plan to move it to the Grand Lodge up in Alma (about 80 miles northeast of Grand Rapids); and just possibly this is down to nothing but clashing egos, which happens all too often these days. But whatever the reason may be, this announcement is shocking. 

(EDIT: I've just been told that the situation involves NONE of my speculations...)

The following press release was posted on the Library's Facebook page today:

IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT REGARDING LIBRARY NAME CHANGE & RELOCATION

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

DETROIT, MICH - JULY 2, 2026

Our name has changed a few times over the past 143 years, but our mission has always remained the same: to preserve the rich history of Freemasonry in Detroit. With this in mind, we have decided to re-adopt our original 1882 name: Masonic Library of Detroit. These changes will be gradually rolled-out over the coming weeks and months. We feel this historic name better represents our broader purpose, and is more appropriate following recent events.

On June 30th, 2026, the long-standing lease for our space on the 4th Floor of the Detroit Masonic Temple expired, and the Masonic Temple Association of Detroit declined to offer a renewal lease. We are deeply saddened by having to leave our home of 100 years, but we remain steadfast in our mission, particularly the preservation and digitization of our historic documents & 10,000-volume collection of Masonic books. Our new business address for donations and correspondence is: 1401 W Fort St. #32090 Detroit, MI 48233.

While we have thoroughly enjoyed providing engaging & informative tours of the Detroit Masonic Temple in partnership with the Masonic Temple Association of Detroit for the past decade, as of February 2026, the Masonic Temple Association terminated our tour operating agreement without notice. We are unaware of what plans the Masonic Temple Association may have for tours going forward. We will certainly miss sharing our knowledge, passion, and love of the Detroit Masonic Temple with our Brothers as well as the public at large.

We wish the Detroit Masonic Temple a happy Centennial Anniversary, and wish the Masonic Temple Association of Detroit success in their future endeavors.

For further inquiries, please contact us at: info@masoniclibrarydetroit.org

The business address of the newly renamed Detroit Masonic Library is nothing but a post office box, so there's no word on where the actual collection may go at this time.