Page 24 - Essex Mason Issue 85

Almoner

Provincial Almoners News
by ProvGA W.Bro. Nick Clarke

Last year has once again been very busy with our responsibilities to the ever-increasing number of
people in need and also trying to put new ideas in motion for the year ahead, here is a summary of
what is and has been happening.
We are now well into the New Year and the almoner’s team have been in touch with all the unattached widows to send
them our best wishes and a Christmas cheque. We keep in touch twice a year and they now all receive a copy of “Better
Lives”. The one recurring theme in all the responses I get is” It is so nice to know I am not forgotten”
Christmas Lunches took place in many centres and the response were excellent. If a centre did not organise such an
event last year, we do encourage them to try and make it happen in the future as this is a central way of helping to
alleviate loneliness.
Spring Lunches and Teas have now been arranged in five centres for April 2019 so that the unattached widows and many others can get out and meet
people. We have run several of these last year and they have all been successful. Many lodges and centres organise their own functions without my
involvement and this is to be applauded, if they wish to have their events advertised to the widow’s groups that we are starting please let me know.
6000 Christmas cards were distributed to lodges by the Deputy Group Almoners. I hope these were put to good use and that they helped you all to keep
in touch with our claimants, widows and widowers, many of who are lonely.
The EPCF is very appreciative of any donations that lodges send and even though Christmas is over it is never too late to make a
contribution. Cheques should be made out to the EPCF and sent to me please. These donations greatly assist the funding of widow’s
cheques at Christmas which this last year was £4300 and the many extra payments we always need to make to help people in the colder
weather.
CHAPS screening events are being planned for 2019. We have had a good last year but attendances at the centres vary and this is
definitely narrowed down to where the best promotional effort is put in by the local lodge almoners and the local almoner’s team in
the area. We are working closely with CHAPS to make future events bigger and maybe to have more of them. 10% of screenings result in a cancer being
detected.
Lodge Almoner Training and Communication Events are being held in April 2019 as follows. 5th April Upminster, 12th April Kirby Cross and 26th April
Harlow. All will be from 9.30am to 2.30pm and include a buffet lunch. These will be aimed specifically at recently appointed almoners and their deputies but
all almoners are welcome. invites will go out to lodges after the new year. The next large Almoners conference will be held in April 2020.
The Provincial Almoner team have had their annual refresher training on the work they do when visiting claimants. For this work they are fully insured with
the MCF and they are kept updated on all the current Benefit opportunities, Safeguarding and GDPR guidelines. The latter two having been written this last
year for EPCF Trustees and Group Almoners.
The role of Deputy Lodge Almoner is now approved by the Province and should be considered by lodges. It will help the Lodge Almoner develop his work
which can be time consuming and it will help to plan for a seamless transition when the lodge Almoner retires. Please note that it is a role and not an office.
Lodge Almoner’s reports are a vital way of sharing news about brethren, however they must not contain the details of a person’s illness or other distress
unless the almoner has been given specific permission for such information to be read out in open lodge. There is no problem in mentioning a brother’s
name.
EPCF pens light the way. This is the latest useful product that the almoner’s team have been selling and it has been well received. By the time you read
this message we will have sold nearly 1000 pens over Christmas. Thank you to those that purchased one and who have found the light on the end to be
very useful.
The National Provincial Almoners Conference held last year in Nottingham was excellent with a string of very good speakers, some we hope to get to
our conference in 2020. Dr David Staples, CEO and Secretary of UGLE was the final key note speaker and his talk was titled “Risk takers, Caretakers and
Undertakers”. His talk was well called and he spoke about preserving all that is good in freemasonry but having the courage to take risks in getting rid of all
that is not so good, unnecessary and old fashioned in our modern world. We will be developing how this may have an impact on almoners over the next year.
Lodge Almoner Newsletters are sent out every month by their local Deputy Group Almoner and we hope that these are increasingly becoming more useful
in keeping lodge almoners up to date and in helping them prepare their own lodge reports. It is good to hear from the APGM’s that when they visit lodges,
they are observing an ever-increasing standard in the reports which is excellent to hear.
The Lodge Almoner’s role in helping to reduce loneliness is at the heart of what we are trying to do. The lodge almoner has a vital role to play with his
pastoral care and as David Innes (Chief Executive at MCF) said at the PGA conference “Giving pastoral support for people who are alone is a vital and
essential part of a lodge almoners role”
Here are some facts about loneliness which
could be described as social isolation. Apart from
actually being alone physically It could happen in
a crowd, at a party, at a meeting by not being
recognised, by not having a purpose or by not
feeling valued and important.
• 9 million people in the UK are often or
always lonely
• 43% of 17 to 25-year olds are lonely
• 50% of disabled people will be lonely on
a given day
• 3.9 million people say that TV is their only
contact with people
• 360,000 people say they do not have a
conversation with a friend each week
• 16.1% of all people say they feel
increasingly invisible
• Over 50% of people over the age of 75
live alone
So, let us ask ourselves what can we do to make
a life better, can we make a phone call, write a
letter, visit somebody or arrange for them to visit
other people in a similar situation. Whatever we
can do will make a difference to that person and
this is why we are so keen to develop lunches,
widows’ clubs, games activities, theatre trips etc.
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