I have just given the annual lecture to Parthenon Lodge No 112, in the Grand Lodge of Greece in Athens, following in the footsteps of the likes of John Belton and John Hamill. The subject of the lecture was the Lost Rites of Freemasonry, a topic that I am currently researching for a new book out with publishers Lewis Masonic at the end of the next year.
The lodge is of course named after the Parthenon, the majestic Temple that sits elegantly above the ancient city of Athens, and as a gift I was presented with a polished Ashlar of marble taken from the same quarry as the marble of the Parthenon. Other highlights of the trip was to visit the Parthenon and the Temple of Poseidon; both spectacular Temples of the Ancient World that remind us of how stone masons constructed Temples of the Gods and the perfection and beauty that still survives today.
I would like to thank the Brethren of Parthenon Lodge for making me feel so welcome.
Jim Morrison, lead singer of The Doors and forever a member of the 27 Club, was an amazing talent that died far too young, but during his brief career as singer, musician and poet, he revealed an interest in the occult that is reminiscent of other musicians of the time, such as 
With a blend of alchemy and scrying, John Dee and Edward Kelley made up one of the most sensational occult partnerships of all time, but did they really talk to Angels?
Caergybi church in Holyhead, North Wales, is a church that has its origins dating back to the 6th century, when St Cybi – a Welsh saint who according to tradition was a cousin of St David – resided in a monks cell on the site. The church is set within a small Roman fort that dates to the 4th century, and the fort is unique to Wales as it is still standing almost in its entirety. The walls are constructed of local materials, the stone set in a typical Roman ‘herring-bone’ fashion, and the walls of the fort give a fascinating insight into Roman stonework and masonry. St Cybi was probably given the fort for his cell by a local king; the old Roman centres such as Chester and York becoming important centres for early Christianity during the sub-Roman period, the available stone sometimes being re-used for new religious buildings such as can be seen at Hexham Abbey. The old Roman centres also retained some strategic importance during this sub-Roman period, such as Chester, which was the location of a battle in the early 7th century. By the 7th century however, as the Venerable Bede tells us in his Ecclesiastical History, that Stone masons were brought from Gaul, to build a church ‘in the Roman manner’, which suggests that building skills had been lost in Britain sometime after the withdrawal of Roman troops in the early 5th century.
Sir Thomas Browne (1605-1682) was a man of the renaissance, an English writer and researcher, his most enigmatic work perhaps being 
The village of Orford had a typical village structure by the early twentieth century; it had a Hall, it had a church, a village school and a pub, along with scattered farms, cottages and shops. The Hall was once owned by the Blackburne family and the village pub is still called the Blackburne Arms. William Beamont who had served as Warrington’s first Mayor in 1847, moved into the Hall in the late nineteenth century and built a new village school in 1861, to replace the old school that had been built by John Blackburne. The school was also used for religious services until the church was opened in 1908. The old school building is now demolished, but there is still a school in Orford. The Hall was demolished in the 1930s and was situated in what is now Orford Park. Some of the stones from the Hall can still be seen in the gardens of the park, the Hall gate posts can still be seen and part of a wall from an outbuilding is still standing. Here are a few of the photos of old Orford that I kept from the Memories Project.
