Weekend of May 1

What a busy weekend.

Saturday began with a bang. Within the by laws of the Imperial Council of Shriners International is a section allowing for a Potentate to create a "Leadership Search Committee". The goal is to find a list of potential future leaders for the Shrine. To my knowledge this committee has never been created by a Potentate at Moslem in a long, long time.

I found three members, who I believe would be impartial in their selection of a potential list and asked them to have results by the end of March.

In conjunction with this, we took the list of members and invited them to a John Maxwell Leadership Training course entitled "The 360 degree leader", which taught how individual can be effective leaders at a local level (e.g. Shrine Club or Unit). Our Grand Lodge of Michigan has been teaching this course over the last couple of years and one of the Grand Lodge officers (also a proud member of Moslem Shriners) volunteered to conduct a class this year.

The combined result was a very well attended, well conducted 8 hour training session that began at 8:00 A.M. Saturday. 20 members attended, and the feedback was very positive. I believe that I saw the future of our Shrine's leadership sitting in that room, and at the end of the class, bought into the notion that more leadership training of this type is necessary to educate, train, and find effective leadership for Moslem's future.

After the session, I attended a benefit event, hosted by one of our Masonic Lodges in Dearborn, MI. This event raised money to assist in a fellow brothers struggle with a serious injury, while on duty as a Wayne County Sheriff. Our own Shrine Hungry Five donated the food, labor, handling for the event, in which hundreds and hundreds attended. There were law enforcement officials from almost every city and county, along with many leaders in that community. It was amazing to see the familial bonding of the husbands, wives, and children. But more amazing was the amount of members of our craft within this community. The Detroit Pipe and Drum band played, and every member was a member of the craft, of which the majority were also Shriners.

So many people came up to me thanking the Masons and Shriners for their unselfish support to this just cause. It literally brought a tear to my eye seeing the man of the hour, his wife and 2 year old son have a moment of joy and happiness, in what has to be a period of grief and frustration the past couple of months.

I am soooooo verrrrry proud to be a member of these brothers, who volunteered their time on a weekend night to help a fallen brother.



Sunday May 2: This is how my life is blessed by the Supreme Architect. I did not see my lovely and talented bride in almost 2 days. She woke up, took me out to lunch and surprised me by taking me to see the Tigers. My first game of the season, and Justin Verlander took a 1 hit shut out into the 9th, and almost got the complete game shutout. Nevertheless, it was a great game, great afternoon with my wife. We came home and I made my famous "Mike's Marvelous Mostaccioli".

Like I said, what a great weekend and it has cemented within me that everything that is being accomplished is for a reason and betterment of our society.

Much Love