Liam, who runs the Lodge Twitter account writes…..

In only twelve months the University Lodge of Liverpool No.4274 (ULOL) Twitter account has gone from having zero ‘followers’ to now having well in excess of 600.  The interest shown in who we are and what we do is across all sections of our community and not just amongst Masons.

In a time where social media and technology is so relied upon, it is evident that utilising this medium within Lodges is becoming more important and apparent. However, we cannot allow any of our members to fall behind who perhaps don’t choose to use the latest smartphone, or have never heard of Tik Tok, let alone knowing where to start with taking a selfie or posting a tweet. So, how do we proceed in this modern day and age and ensure that all are included and understand the traditions we follow, the charitable support we offer and the part we can play in society? 

If one thing is for certain, the recent lockdown period has highlighted that social media is so heavily needed and relied upon by many more people today, including Freemasons.   Zoom meetings have been adopted and used to good effect by many Lodges up and down the country, including our own in order to stay in touch with members and attend virtual conferences and webinars. 

ULOL has an official page on Facebook …….(https://www.facebook.com/UniversityFreemasonryLodgeofLiverpool/)

along with a closed Group for private messaging and Twitter, as well as regularly using our website to ensure communications are kept modernised and appealing to all audiences, but some Lodges and Provinces are now even moving towards using the likes of Instagram, YouTube and Snapchat in order to publicise the significant charitable work that Freemasons support and engage in throughout our local communities. 

To draw back to my point of including all, while we must look to the future we should also balance this with our established practices to ensure we get an effective mix.   We have already widely adopted email as a main method of communication and this is arguably more effective than a simple text, but some Lodges also still prefer to send hand written letters, as is the preferred way of receiving a communication by some of our older members.   

In addition to having a presence on social media, we can ensure that the members pathway and all of the online Masonic learning available to members are widely encouraged and used, but also more importantly understood by members. 

In all of this it is important that the lack of access to, or familiarity with, social media such as Twitter must not divide the members of a Lodge, especially ours.  The challenge is to use whatever might be appropriate and we will in the immediate future need to work at planning properly, engaging effectively but most of all communicating clearly if we are to succeed.

Interested in following us ? – you can join us on Twitter : @Freemasonry4274