Showing posts with label Religion and Spirituality. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Religion and Spirituality. Show all posts

Friday, December 4, 2009

Grace Anne Maning - Names Meaning

I know im late, but I want to greet you a Happy Birthday Grace Anne Maning!

Your parents may have already told you the meaning of your name or the reason why they have chosen it. Since, its your Birthday, I want to share to you my own idea about it..

grace anne maning


In my own idea, word for word, Grace Anne means, in english GRACE and in Hebrew ANNE - Which also means "grace or favor". You are Grace to the second power!

The meaning of GRACE is unmerited favor given by God, even Life itself is God's grace. You are a precious gift given to your parents from Him.

Your second name ANNE, which means favor, may denote the kindness of beneficence of our God. It expresses the unconditional love that God has for all of us. It means blessings, mercy, pardon, good-will, happiness, beauty, etc.. All the good things we enjoy in life for free. You can also be a Grace for others in need..

God has also given you one more important Grace that you should use wisely, and that is Freedom, the capacity to choose your own way. You should know the difference between right and wrong.

We should thank your parents for giving you such a wonderful name, because every time people will say or hear your name, they can think about how amazing  God's love is.

Here is a song entitled

Amazing Grace
by John Newton (1725-1807)
Stanza 6 anon.

Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound,
That saved a wretch like me.
I once was lost but now am found,
Was blind, but now I see.

T'was Grace that taught my heart to fear.
And Grace, my fears relieved.
How precious did that Grace appear
The hour I first believed.

Through many dangers, toils and snares
I have already come;
'Tis Grace that brought me safe thus far
and Grace will lead me home.

The Lord has promised good to me.
His word my hope secures.
He will my shield and portion be,
As long as life endures.

Yea, when this flesh and heart shall fail,
And mortal life shall cease,
I shall possess within the veil,
A life of joy and peace.

When we've been here ten thousand years
Bright shining as the sun.
We've no less days to sing God's praise
Than when we've first begun.

Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound,
That saved a wretch like me.
I once was lost but now am found,
Was blind, but now I see.  

Any reactions are accepted, please feel free to write a comment beneath this post. You can also subscribe to this blog for future updates by visiting this link.

Saturday, October 31, 2009

When is the best time for Teachers to connect?

By Cora Maning - Lahug Elementary School Teacher
my mother

When things in life get rough, and you need a shoulder to lean on, come to me and I’ll lead you.

Oftentimes, people remember God only when their struggles prove to be too much and too many for them to face alone.
.
A teacher’s life may not be a bed of roses but it’s full of grace from God. Every time problems come across, there’s always Him who helps us carry the load.

A message from A. J. Russell in “God Calling”, God said, “If you only had sought my friendship long ago many of your difficulties would not have existed. Your life would have been different.”

Of course, if given the chance to be born again, I would still want to be a teacher, and I know some teachers do.



There might be difficult times for us, times that we realize we have no more time for ourselves. A day is never enough for our pupils, friends and family.

However, after a day’s work, a teacher asks, “What have I done today?”

Life may not be easy for all of us and there are times we want to fall. The only strength that melts all thread of burden and tiresome moments is God’s presence in our lives.

He is a Good Shepherd as we are to our pupils.

When is the best time to connect to God? He said, “Seek Me early, that is the only way to find Me.”
Find time to talk to Him from 3:00 – 4:00 AM before He gets crowded by life’s troubles, difficulties, demands and pressures.


Any reactions are accepted, please feel free to write a comment beneath this post. You can also subscribe to this blog for future updates by visiting this link.

Wednesday, June 17, 2009

Seven Reasons Why a Scientist Believes in God

While others believe, some still doubt. But when questions made unanswered, there is only one absolute answer you can turn to, and that is GOD. I share to you a very wonderful written master piece by a Scientist, revealing to us the existence of our Heavenly Creator.

I say "Faith is strongly believing in something unreal and without proof, that because of the strength of your belief, you have made real the things that you believe in.. Like God, Hope, and Love."

Seven Reasons Why a Scientist Believes in God
By: A. CRESSY MORRISON,
Former President of the New York Academy of Sciences

WE ARE STILL IN THE DAWN of the scientific age, and every increase of light reveals more brightly the handiwork of an intelligent Creator. We have made stupendous discoveries; with a spirit of scientific humility and of faith grounded in knowledge we are approaching ever nearer to an awareness of God.

For myself, I count seven reasons for my faith:

First: By unwavering mathematical law we can prove that our universe was designed and executed by a great engineering intelligence.

Suppose you put ten pennies, marked from one to ten, into your pocket and give them a good shuffle. Now try to take them out in sequence from one to ten, putting back the coin each time and shaking them all again. Mathematically we know that your chance of first drawing number one is one in ten; of drawing one and two in succession, one in 100; of drawing one, two and three in succession, one in 1000, and so on; your chance of drawing them all, from number one to number ten in succession, would reach the unbelievable figure of one in ten billion.

By the same reasoning, so many exacting conditions are necessary for life on the earth that they could not possibly exist in proper relationship by chance. The earth rotates on its axis 1000 miles an hour at the equator; if it turned at 100 miles an hour, our days and nights would be ten times as long as now, and the hot sun would likely burn up our vegetation each long day while in the long night any surviving sprout might well freeze.

Again the sun, source of our life, has a surface temperature of 10,000 degrees Fahrenheit, and our earth is just far enough away so that this "eternal life" warms us just enough and not too much ! If the sun gave off only one half its present radiation, we would freeze, and if it gave as much more, we would roast.

The slant of the earth, tilted at an angle of 23 degrees, gives us our seasons; if the earth had not been so tilted, vapors from the ocean would move north and south, piling up for us continents of ice. If our moon were, say, only 50,000 miles away instead of its actual distance, our tides might be so enormous that twice a day all continents would be submerged; even the mountains could soon be eroded away. If the crust of the earth had only been ten feet thicker, there would be no oxygen, without which animal life must die. Had the ocean been a few feet deeper, carbon dioxide and oxygen would have been absorbed and no vegetable life could exist.

It is apparent from these and a host of other examples that there is not one chance in billions that life on our planet is an accident.

Second: The resourcefulness of life to accomplish its purpose is a manifestation of an all-pervading Intelligence.

What life itself is, no man has fathomed. It has neither weight nor dimensions, but it does have force; a growing root will crack a rock. Life has conquered water, land and air, mastering the elements, compelling them to dissolve and reform their combinations.

Life, the sculptor, shapes all living things; an artist, it designs every leaf of every tree, and colors every flower. Life is a musician and has taught each bird to sing its love song, the insects to call one another in the music of their multitudinous sounds. Life is a sublime chemist, giving taste to fruits and spices, and perfume to the rose, changing water and carbonic acid into sugar and wood, and, in so doing, releasing oxygen that animals may have the breath of life.

Behold an almost invisible drop of protoplasm, transparent, jellylike, capable of motion, drawing energy from the sun. This single cell, this transparent mist-like droplet, holds within itself the germ of life, and has power to distribute this life to every living thing, great and small. The powers of this droplet are greater than our vegetation and animals and people, for all life came from it. Nature did not create life; fire-blistered rocks and a saltless sea could not meet the necessary requirements.

Who, then, has put it here?

Third: Animal wisdom speaks irresistibly of a good Creator who infused instinct into otherwise helpless little creatures.

The young salmon spends years at sea, then comes back to his own river, and travels up the very side of the river into which flows the tributary where he was born. What brings him back so precisely? If you transfer him to another tributary he will know at once that he is off his course and he will fight his way down and back to the main stream and then turn up against the current to finish his destiny accurately.

Even more difficult to solve is the mystery of eels. These amazing creatures migrate at maturity from ponds and rivers everywhere - those from Europe across thousands of miles of ocean - all bound for the same abysmal deeps near Bermuda. There they breed and die. The little ones, with no apparent means of knowing anything except that they are in a wilderness of water, nevertheless start back and find their way not only to the very shore from which their parents came but thence to the selfsame rivers, lakes or little ponds. No American eel has ever been caught in Europe, no European eel in American waters. Nature has even delayed the maturity of the European eel by a year or more to make up for its longer journey. Where does the directional impulse originate?

Fourth: Man has something more than animal instinct - the power of reason.

No other animal has ever left a record of its ability to count ten, or even to understand the meaning of ten. Where instinct is like a single note of a flute, beautiful but limited, the human brain contains all the notes of all the instruments in the orchestra. No need to belabor this fourth point; thanks to human reason we can contemplate the possibility that we are what we are only because we have received a spark of Universal Intelligence.

Fifth: Provision for all living is revealed in such phenomena as the wonders of genes.

So tiny are these genes that, if all of them responsible for all living people in the world could be put in one place, there would be less than a thimbleful. Yet these genes inhabit every living cell and are the keys to all human, animal and vegetable characteristics. A thimble is a small place to hold all the individual characteristics of almost three billion human beings. However, the facts are beyond question.

Here evolution really begins - at the cell, the entity which holds and carries the genes. That the ultra-microscopic gene can absolutely rule all life on earth is an example of profound cunning and provision that could emanate only from a Creative Intelligence; no other hypothesis will serve.

Sixth: By the economy of nature, we are forced to realize that only infinite wisdom could have foreseen and prepared with such astute husbandry.

Many years ago a species of cactus was planted in Australia as a protective fence. Having no insect enemies in Australia, the cactus soon began a prodigious growth; the alarming abundance persisted until the plants covered an area as long and wide as England, crowding inhabitants out of the towns and villages, and destroying their farms. Seeking a defense, entomologists scoured the world; finally they turned up an insect which lived exclusively on cactus, and would eat nothing else. It would breed freely, too; and it had no enemies in Australia. So animal soon conquered vegetable, and today the cactus pest has retreated - and with it all but a small protective residue of the insects, enough to hold the cactus in check forever.

Such checks and balances have been universally provided. Why have not fast-breeding insects dominated the earth? Because they have no lungs such as man possesses; they breathe through tubes. But when insects grow large, their tubes do not grow in ratio to the increasing size of the body. Hence there never has been an insect of great size; this limitation on growth has held them all in check. If this physical check had not been provided, man could not exist. Imagine meeting a hornet as big as a lion !

Seventh: The fact that man can conceive the idea of God is in itself a unique proof.

The conception of God rises from a divine faculty of man, unshared with the rest of our world - the faculty we call imagination. By its power, man and man alone can find the evidence of things unseen. The vista that power opens up is unbounded; indeed, as man's perfected imagination becomes a spiritual reality, he may discern in all the evidence of design and purpose the great truth that heaven is wherever and whatever; that God is everywhere and in everything that nowhere so close as in our hearts.

It is scientifically as well as imaginatively true, as the Psalmist said: The heavens declare the Glory of God and the firmament showeth His handiwork.

Tuesday, May 19, 2009

Poem - God's Grace

God’s Grace

You are an object of a man’s dream,

Like a girl besides a stream.

I look at you and I see a face of greatness,

Filled with bounties and graces.

Untouched and free as a wind,

With dreams of limitless end.

No answers nor even clues,

To the puzzled eyes that views.


Oh! Please tell me what hides in that smile?

Maybe they’re treasures in file!

Lucky for me to see and touch God’s grace,

And to feel her sweet embrace.

I love her for what she is,

Locked forever in mine heart my miss.

Sunday, August 17, 2008

The Patience of St. Joseph


The Patience of St. Joseph

Just this afternoon I heard my friend Keziah Reyes telling a story in front of my colleagues and it was all about the homily from the day’s mass. It was about a girl who never had met the man of her life. She had in her possession a statue of St. Joseph, the biological father of Jesus, whom she believed that if she’d pray to him everyday, Saint Joseph would endow her a companion in her life. As the days passed by, no one came. Years have already passed yet still no body came for her, and then she began to lose hope. Until she turned 40, she was so depressed that she got angry at the statue that she threw the statue out of her window.

Then suddenly a knock on her door came and it was a man, whose head was bleeding because something hit him, it turns out that it was the statue of St. Joseph that hit him. The man came inside her house and from henceforth they fell in love with each other and they live happily ever after!

St. Joseph is known to be a saint of patience, perseverance, persistence, and hard work. St. Joseph is a patron against doubt, uncertainty, and hesitation. He is the patron saint for workers and laborers.

If the person have the ability to wait, endure, and persevere in times of uncertainty, doubt, provocation, trials, etc. God will provide, and I tell you, He shows it in the most remarkable way, when you least expect it!

Wednesday, July 16, 2008

Heartprints

Pass this to all your friends, your family, and your love ones. Send the message that what sent to you and you will experience love like no other and be blessed. Let them experience the same feeling of joy you get from reading this simple yet touching poem (prayer).

Heartprints


Whatever our hands touch --

We leave fingerprints!

On walls, on furniture

On doorknobs, dishes, books.

There's no escape.

As we touch we leave our identity.



Oh God, wherever I go today

Help me leave heartprints!

Heartprints of compassion

Of understanding and love.



Heartprints of kindness

And genuine concern.

May my heart touch a lonely neighbor

Or a runaway daughter

Or an anxious mother

Or perhaps an aged grandfather.



Lord, send me out today

To leave heartprints.

And if someone should say,

"I felt your touch,"

May that one sense YOUR LOVE

Touching through ME.




~ Author Unknown ~

Friday, May 16, 2008

The Tale of the Three Trees

Sometimes we feel like our life has gone out of control and that things are happening not the way you want them to be. Your dreams are left just as dreams and that realizing it becomes even more difficult. And there are even times, sad to say, that we blame it to God.

I want to share with you this little story I came across way back years ago. I happen to have read this story when I was still a working student at DSWD (Department of Social Welfare Development). When I was arranging the files and cleaning up the drawer, I saw this piece of hard paper, and on it was written a tale that would truly change the way you look at your life now.

"The Tale of Three Trees"

Author unknown

Once upon a mountain top, three little trees stood and dreamed of what they wanted to become when they grew up. The first little tree looked up at the stars and said: "I want to hold treasure. I want to be covered with gold and filled with precious stones. I'll be the most beautiful treasure chest in the world!" The second little tree looked out at the small stream trickling by on its way to the ocean. "I want to be traveling mighty waters and carrying powerful kings. I'll be the strongest ship in the world!" The third little tree looked down into the valley below where busy men and women worked in a busy town. "I don't want to leave the mountain top at all. I want to grow so tall that when people stop to look at me, they'll raise their eyes to heaven and think of God. I will be the tallest tree in the world."

Years passed and the little trees grew tall. One day three woodcutters climbed the mountain. The first woodcutter looked at the first tree and said, "This tree is beautiful. It is perfect for me." With a swoop of his shining ax, the first tree fell. "Now I shall be made into a beautiful chest, I shall hold wonderful treasure!" the first tree said. The second woodcutter looked at the second tree and said, "This tree is strong. It is perfect for me." With a swoop of his shining ax, the second tree fell. "Now I shall sail mighty waters!" thought the second tree. "I shall be a strong ship for mighty kings!" The third tree felt her heart sink when the last woodcutter looked her way. She stood straight and tall and pointed bravely to heaven. But the woodcutter never even looked up. "Any kind of tree will do for me." He muttered. With a swoop of his shining ax the third tree fell.

The first tree rejoiced when the woodcutter brought her to a carpenter's shop. But the carpenter fashioned the tree into a feed box for animals. The once beautiful tree was not covered with gold or with treasures. She was coated with sawdust and filled with hay for hungry farm animals. The second tree smiled when the woodcutter took her to a shipyard, but no mighty ship was made that day. Instead, the once strong tree was hammered and sawed into a simple fishing boat. She was too small and too weak to sail to an ocean, or even a river. Instead she was taken to a little lake. The third tree was confused when the woodcutter cut her into strong beams and left her in a lumberyard. "What happened?" The once tall tree wondered. "All I ever wanted was to stay on the mountain top and point to God..."

Many, many days and nights passed. The three trees nearly forgot their dreams. But one night, golden starlight poured over the first tree as a young woman placed her newborn baby in the feed box. "I wish I could make a cradle for him," her husband whispered. The mother squeezed his hand and smiled as the starlight shone on the smooth and the sturdy wood. "This manger is beautiful," she said. And suddenly the first tree knew he was holding the greatest treasure in the world.

One evening a tired traveler and his friends crowded into the old fishing boat. The traveler fell asleep as the second tree quietly sailed out into the lake. Soon a thundering and thrashing storm arose. The little tree shuddered. She knew she did not have the strength to carry so many passengers safely through the wind and the rain. The tired man awakened. He stood up, stretched out his hand and said, "Peace." The storm stopped as quickly as it had begun. And suddenly the second tree knew he was carrying the King of heaven and earth.

One Friday morning, the third tree was startled when her beams were yanked from the forgotten woodpile. She flinched as she was carried through an angry jeering crowd. She shuddered when soldiers nailed a man's hands to her. She felt ugly and harsh and cruel. But on Sunday morning, when the sun rose and the earth trembled with joy beneath her, the third tree knew that God's love had changed everything. It had made the third tree strong. And every time people thought of the third tree, they would think of God.

That was better than being the tallest tree in the world.

What can you say about this story? When I finished reading it, it changed my view about life. And at that moment I knew that God has a separate plan for me. Each of us has our own blue print in life. We all have different dreams and ambitions in life, these dreams and ambitions are grounded by our present needs. We always want to be in control of our life, we want to control our future. However hard we try to do things the way we want our future to be. There are these never-ending obstacles that we continually face.

Life is never a smooth sailing, never dream of a smooth life, cause in the end, if you have overcome those challenges, you will sit proud and shall tell yourself that you have lived a life the way a man should. And that all dreams that you wanted will be realized in time, maybe not the exact thing, but for sure God has given it you because you deserve it.


Now spread this story to all your friends. To comment it on Friendster or MySpace, just use the code below. Copy it and paste it on the comment box.









The Tale of the Three Trees

Sometimes we feel like our life has gone out of control and that things are happening not the way you want them to be. Your dreams are left just as dreams and that realizing it becomes even more difficult. And there are even times, sad to say, that we blame it to God.

I want to share with you this little story I came across way back years ago. I happen to have read this story when I was still a working student at DSWD (Department of Social Welfare Development). When I was arranging the files and cleaning up the drawer, I saw this piece of hard paper, and on it was written a tale that would truly change the way you look at your life now.

"The Tale of Three Trees"

Author unknown

Once upon a mountain top, three little trees stood and dreamed of what they wanted to become when they grew up. The first little tree looked up at the stars and said: "I want to hold treasure. I want to be covered with gold and filled with precious stones. I'll be the most beautiful treasure chest in the world!" The second little tree looked out at the small stream trickling by on its way to the ocean. "I want to be traveling mighty waters and carrying powerful kings. I'll be the strongest ship in the world!" The third little tree looked down into the valley below where busy men and women worked in a busy town. "I don't want to leave the mountain top at all. I want to grow so tall that when people stop to look at me, they'll raise their eyes to heaven and think of God. I will be the tallest tree in the world."

Years passed and the little trees grew tall. One day three woodcutters climbed the mountain. The first woodcutter looked at the first tree and said, "This tree is beautiful. It is perfect for me." With a swoop of his shining ax, the first tree fell. "Now I shall be made into a beautiful chest, I shall hold wonderful treasure!" the first tree said. The second woodcutter looked at the second tree and said, "This tree is strong. It is perfect for me." With a swoop of his shining ax, the second tree fell. "Now I shall sail mighty waters!" thought the second tree. "I shall be a strong ship for mighty kings!" The third tree felt her heart sink when the last woodcutter looked her way. She stood straight and tall and pointed bravely to heaven. But the woodcutter never even looked up. "Any kind of tree will do for me." He muttered. With a swoop of his shining ax the third tree fell.

The first tree rejoiced when the woodcutter brought her to a carpenter's shop. But the carpenter fashioned the tree into a feed box for animals. The once beautiful tree was not covered with gold or with treasures. She was coated with sawdust and filled with hay for hungry farm animals. The second tree smiled when the woodcutter took her to a shipyard, but no mighty ship was made that day. Instead, the once strong tree was hammered and sawed into a simple fishing boat. She was too small and too weak to sail to an ocean, or even a river. Instead she was taken to a little lake. The third tree was confused when the woodcutter cut her into strong beams and left her in a lumberyard. "What happened?" The once tall tree wondered. "All I ever wanted was to stay on the mountain top and point to God..."

Many, many days and nights passed. The three trees nearly forgot their dreams. But one night, golden starlight poured over the first tree as a young woman placed her newborn baby in the feed box. "I wish I could make a cradle for him," her husband whispered. The mother squeezed his hand and smiled as the starlight shone on the smooth and the sturdy wood. "This manger is beautiful," she said. And suddenly the first tree knew he was holding the greatest treasure in the world.

One evening a tired traveler and his friends crowded into the old fishing boat. The traveler fell asleep as the second tree quietly sailed out into the lake. Soon a thundering and thrashing storm arose. The little tree shuddered. She knew she did not have the strength to carry so many passengers safely through the wind and the rain. The tired man awakened. He stood up, stretched out his hand and said, "Peace." The storm stopped as quickly as it had begun. And suddenly the second tree knew he was carrying the King of heaven and earth.

One Friday morning, the third tree was startled when her beams were yanked from the forgotten woodpile. She flinched as she was carried through an angry jeering crowd. She shuddered when soldiers nailed a man's hands to her. She felt ugly and harsh and cruel. But on Sunday morning, when the sun rose and the earth trembled with joy beneath her, the third tree knew that God's love had changed everything. It had made the third tree strong. And every time people thought of the third tree, they would think of God.

That was better than being the tallest tree in the world.

What can you say about this story? When I finished reading it, it changed my view about life. And at that moment I knew that God has a separate plan for me. Each of us has our own blue print in life. We all have different dreams and ambitions in life, these dreams and ambitions are grounded by our present needs. We always want to be in control of our life, we want to control our future. However hard we try to do things the way we want our future to be. There are these never-ending obstacles that we continually face.

Life is never a smooth sailing, never dream of a smooth life, cause in the end, if you have overcome those challenges, you will sit proud and shall tell yourself that you have lived a life the way a man should. And that all dreams that you wanted will be realized in time, maybe not the exact thing, but for sure God has given it you because you deserve it.




Wednesday, March 12, 2008

When is the Best Time to Connect?



By Cora Maning - Lahug Elementary School Teacher
my mother

When things in life get rough, and you need a shoulder to lean on, come to me and I’ll lead you.

Oftentimes, people remember God only when their struggles prove to be too much and too many for them to face alone.
.
A teacher’s life may not be a bed of roses but it’s full of grace from God. Every time problems come across, there’s always Him who helps us carry the load.

A message from A. J. Russell in “God Calling”, God said, “If you only had sought my friendship long ago many of your difficulties would not have existed. Your life would have been different.”

Of course, if given the chance to be born again, I would still want to be a teacher, and I know some teachers do.

There might be difficult times for us, times that we realize we have no more time for ourselves. A day is never enough for our pupils, friends and family.

However, after a day’s work, a teacher asks, “What have I done today?”

Life may not be easy for all of us and there are times we want to fall. The only strength that melts all thread of burden and tiresome moments is God’s presence in our lives.

He is a Good Shepherd as we are to our pupils.

When is the best time to connect to God? He said, “Seek Me early, that is the only way to find Me.”
Find time to talk to Him from 3:00 – 4:00 AM before He gets crowded by life’s troubles, difficulties, demands and pressures.

Sto. Niño Church




Another day-off for me, another time for my family, my baby. I decided to take her to the usual place we always go to when I somehow remember God. It is sad to say that I always forget to say thank you to God for His blessings. I only remember Him when I am down, and that ‘is’ a sad thing. I think most people do. I admire people who go to church every Sunday.

Anyway, this visit now is not to go to Him because
I am down but rather to visit Him to say thanks. I was happy that that day I was able to visit Him, and most of all I brought my kid with me. I took her to Jesus’ house of worship. Although we weren’t able to attend the mass, but we were able to light some candles and pray.

It is so amazing that Sto. Niño has changed a lot by time. Sto. Niño is not just for worship anymore, there are also people coming over to see the aged old church, a church that had become one of Cebu’s symbol, and not only for the island of Cebu, but also for it’s people.

The church symbolizes the strong faith of the Cebuano people towards Jesus Christ. As time goes by, the church may age, but the faith of the devotos will always rebirth thru their offspring. I may not be a devoto myself, I am just a regular sinner who in reality could never change, but before I die, I want to impart the respect, fear and love for God to my child for her to learn that God is the only place to go, to make oneself comfortable in times of insecurity. I want her to be like me, when faced with questions that could not be answered, I immediately turn to God.

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