There is no shortage of groups who need a helping hand and a hug number of families in Leeds are struggling.
One of The Lodge of Dawn’s newest members, Eóin Byrne, saw this situation and wanted to use the power of Freemasonry to make a difference. He suggested that the Lodge of Dawn in Leeds, should start a monthly collection for a local food bank.
Eóin put together a proposal, and a draft plan as to how he saw this working, and this was put forward to the lodge committee. This was immediately approved and lodge committee gave it their full blessing and Eoin started to get the ball rolling.
Let's Eat
The food bank that the Lodge chose to work with, the Let’s Eat Project, is based in Chapeltown and run by the Chapeltown Youth Development Centre (CYDC). A charity known to Leeds Freemason's as it is one that they have previously secured a grant for, in order to build an all-weather sports pitch. Once contact was made with CYDC, their Service Manager, Will Bowler, was more than happy to let us trial our donations. They sent the lodge a shopping list of the key items that they needed which was passed on to the brethren.
Usually running a collection like this one would assume it would go somewhat under the radar and that items might arrive in dribs and drabs. That was certainly not the case with the brethren at The Lodge of Dawn.
The first drop-off collection was agreed for the regular December ceremony on 21st December. However upon the announcement of the scheme, before the in-person collection was due to take place, brethren immediately started emailing and texting pledging and donating cash towards the fund. Within three days of its announcement almost £600 had been collected. Knowing that CFYDC’s final food collection of the year was the day after the proposed drop off collection, it was decided to make sure that supplies were with them as soon as possible so they could start getting food parcels together.
The Donations
Eoin shopped around a number of wholesalers and supermarkets to find where the lodge could get the most value for money and an order was placed which arrived at the end of the first week of the initiative. On Friday 16th December, before the in-lodge collection had even begun, the first batch was delivered to CFYDC.
The delivery totalled 24 crates of food, including:
- 192 tins of soup
- 96 ready meals
- 96 tins of beans
- 60kg of pasta
- 48 packets of biscuits
- 34 boxes of cereal
- 25 jars of pasta sauce
- 24 tins of peas
- 24 tins of spaghetti
Upon receipt of the goods, Let’s Eat sent over a message saying,
'I am amazed at the value of this delivery. Truly, truly thankful. Many thanks to you and all your members for the donation. Much appreciated. God Bless You All.'
But that wasn’t all. At the collection at the lodge meeting on Tuesday 20th December many brethren arrived carrying bags and boxes of items to donate on top of everything they had given before. The few crates that had been purchased to store the foodstuff were soon overflowing and it took more than a few trips to stow everything securely.
The food was dropped off to CFYDC the following day to make sure that every last item could be made available before the Foodbank closed over Christmas.
Eóin said,
'It was genuinely overwhelming to see the selflessness and generosity of the brethren over the last few weeks as we started our partnership with CFYDC.'
He continued,
'It’s our plan for this to be the beginning of a relationship that lasts until banks like this are no longer needed. But in the meantime we’ll do what we can every month to make sure that the people of Chapeltown who might fall on hard times have a little less to worry about.'
