The ladies of the Royal Purple want to meet you.

Once shrouded in secrecy, the charitable organization is relaxing the rituals and looking for new members. For 63 years the Victoria lodge has raised money for groups and families, focusing much of its energy on children.

“Anybody who is interested, we are very interested in making them welcome,” said Pat Anderson, a Royal Purple member for 56 years. “It is just a wonderful way to meet other people. You can get as involved as you want or maybe not as involved.”

The Royal Purple of Canada was founded in 1914 in Vancouver as the female branch of the Elks. The organizations raise money for various community groups and individuals, with a focus on children with hearing difficulties.

“We do supply an awful lot of hearing aids for children,” Anderson said.

Royal Purple chapters donate money to provincial and national causes, but they also help people in their immediate communities. The Victoria lodge has helped families with needs such as making homes wheelchair accessible and paying for speech therapy for children.

Often times that means going to the national office for help as the local chapter isn’t able to raise large sums with such a small membership. Despite that, the group raises up to $2,000 annually through garage and bake sales, among other activities.

A healthy lodge has more than 20 members — Victoria has seven. With so few members a lot of the ritual work is reserved for special occasions, something that seems to appeal more to younger members, said Jerry Morris, Victoria lodge president. It’s the next generations the lodge is hoping to attract if it is to continue fundraising for the community.

“That is our main focus — what can we do to raise funds,” Anderson said. “We need new ideas.”

“All of the lodges are suffering,” Morris added.

The lodge meets once a month to discuss business and catch up with each other as members are spread across the Capital Region. Having the chance to socialize with other women, while helping the community, is what drew Anderson and Morris.

“Once I was married and started having children it was someplace I could go and be with women and relax,” Anderson said. “The friendships you make are fantastic. It was mom’s night out.”

Royal Purple is a year-long commitment to fundraising, something that many people don’t seem as interested in, Anderson said.

“People nowadays, they will walk for breast cancer or do a run for something and they figure they have done their charitable work for the year,” she said. “We do it all year.”

For more information go to www.royalpurpleofcanada.org or e-mail Wendy Anderson at wam60@shaw.ca.

reporter@goldstreamgazette.com