About MSA

The Imperial Shrine of North America recognizes 20 regional Shrine Associations. These Associations allow individual Shrine Temples to join together for fun, fellowship and camaraderie. It also allows Shriners an opportunity to share ideas on how to improve Shrinedom in their region of the country. At Association conventions Shrine Units from different Temples compete against one another. Competitions include Chanters, Oriental Bands, Clowns, Motorized Units, Pipes & Drums, Foot Patrols, Horse Units, etc.

Today the Midwest Shrine Association has 14 Shrine Temples with members from the States of Iowa, Minnesota, Wisconsin and North Dakota, South Dakota, Wisconsin, and Michigan plus Temples in the Canadian Provinces of Saskatchewan and Manitoba. These Temples have a combined membership of about 20,000 Nobles of the Mystic Shrine.

The Midwest Shrine Association holds an annual business meeting in early February. Those attending are normally the Shrine Officers from each member Temple along with committee heads that have an interest in topics to be covered at the session. Average attendance at the winter business session is about 250 Shriners.

The summer session is normally held in mid to late August, on a Thursday, Friday and Saturday. The session usually includes two major Shriner parades and time for Shrine Unit competition. All MSA Shriners and their families are invited to attend. In recent years attendance has averaged 2000 to 2500, of which two-thirds are Shriners and the balance Shriner Ladies and family members. A different Temple hosts these meetings each year.

In 2010, Abu Bekr will host the Midwest Shrine Association winter and summer sessions in Sioux City, Iowa. Abu Bekr last hosted MSA in 1998.