Around the world today we celebrate International Women’s Day! This day is an opportunity for us to reflect on the amazing contributions of women to our world and society. I want to ask all of our DeMolays to do three things:
1) Thank the women in your life. Think about the amazing women who have supported you in your life, and reach out to a few of them and let them know why they are important to you and the impact that they made.
2) Thank the women who make Masonic Youth successful! We are blessed to have so many amazing women helping DeMolay:
- We are blessed to have amazing women leaders in our sweetheart program, in Rainbow and in Triangle. Our brothers in other jurisdictions have equally great partners with the DeMolay Sorority Program and Job’s Daughters.
- The hardworking women who serve as advisors and mentors to our youth
- The female guardians and parents who help and encourage us on a daily basis
- The amazing ladies in Eastern Star, Amaranth, Daughters of the Nile, White Shrine of Jerusalem, Ladies Oriental Shrine, Daughters of Mokanna, and other organizations.
- The female spouses of our advisors and Masonic supporters.
Each of these outstanding groups of women help support our Masonic family and the Masonic youth experience. DeMolay would not be successful without them, and I am so grateful for their support of our programs!
3) Learn about famous women: My buddy who works at an art museum asked me to do this exercise once: “Can you name five female artists?” (I was, Grandma Moses, Frida Kahlo, Georgia O’Keefe, Plautilla Nelli, Leonora Carrington) Her point in asking that is she had encountered a number of people who could name dozens and dozens of male artists, but struggled to come up with more than two female artists. I want to challenge you to maybe change the field and ask “Can you name five female scientists?” or “Five female political leaders?” or “Five female authors?” or “Five female CEOs?” or "Five Female Saints." If you can’t take some time today to learn about five women in those fields.
Happy International Women’s Day! Thank you for all that you do!