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When you were growing up, do you remember your parents complaining about money? It seems like there’s never enough of it to go around, spawning the phrase, “Money can’t buy happiness, but it sure helps.” It’s true that a lack of money can lead to a dissatisfaction with your daily life, but that dissatisfaction is the result of a lack of happiness. It’s a result, not a reason.

What does it mean to be happy? Most people will describe happiness as something they have and unhappiness as what they feel when something is missing. It’s the perfect definition, but the way the world today interprets that definition takes away the much deeper meaning behind it. They look at the fact that they are missing something and think, “I have to obtain it.” Then they work hard for the money they need to build their bank accounts and buy that yacht they’ve been dreaming of, that house they’ve been looking at or take that vacation they’ve been planning.

They don’t truly believe that money can’t buy happiness.

The thing is, happiness isn’t something you can buy. Money truly can’t buy happiness, because true, soul deep happiness can be yours for the low, low price of-nothing. True happiness is free! How is that possible? Because Jesus Christ made it available to us at no cost to ourselves the minute he died on that cross.

We as people were never meant for this earth, an earth filled with violence, greed and hate. We were intended for paradise, a paradise spent sitting at the right hand of God and having everything we ever dreamed of at our fingertips. Most importantly, we were meant for peace-the peace that comes from knowing that Jesus Christ is lighting up the dark corners of our soul.

Christ said in John 14:6, “I am the way, the truth and the light.” Money can’t buy happiness. It can only buy a fleeting moment of satisfaction that fades when the novelty is gone. Jesus Christ is the way to true happiness. He is the truth in the lies that society teaches us about happiness, and he is the light in our angry, hurting hearts that takes away all of our pain and offers us the respite of a true, soul deep peace that can’t be disturbed-regardless of whether we’re millionaires or living on Ramen and water.

Money can’t buy happiness. Unhappiness is a result of something we’re missing, but it’s not something that can be found in any store, on the back of any warehouse truck or even in the pews. It’s something we find when we close our eyes, open our hearts and ask the God of Jacob to reach down and touch our lives, blessing us with eternal happiness and the opportunity to spend the rest of our lives in paradise.

Money can’t buy happiness, because it’s never cost us a thing. In fact, it wants to give us something rather than take it away-the happiness, peace and joy that we’ve spent our whole lives searching for.

Ray Subs is a public relations specialist working with Stan Sanderson of the Spiritual Coach Program. To learn more about the Spiritual Coach Program and his book, “The Big Lie,” visit the Spiritual Coach website.

“For God so loved the world that he sent his only begotten son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” John 3:16

Anyone who knows what it’s like to love a child knows the soul deep agony losing that child causes, because it lingers on the edges of their consciousness as their deepest fear. Can you imagine loving someone so much, even though they’ve been petty, and selfish, and cruel, and rejected you at every turn, that you would offer up your only child, subject him to an agonizing death, just so they would know the secret to finding happiness?

Most of us could never conceive of such a thing, willingly offering ourselves up as a sacrifice for the ones we love but protecting our children fiercely. We would never willingly subject them to an experience that was going to cause them harm just to guide someone else on the path to finding happiness. Yet that’s exactly what God did when he sent his son to earth to die on the cross. He sent his child, whom he loved dearly, for the sole purpose of allowing him to suffer persecution and prejudice, torture and rejection and eventually a horrible death on the cross just so a world full of sinners would have the chance to find true happiness in their lives and spend an eternity in paradise after their death.

Most of us spend our entire lives in the pursuit of our constitutional right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. We go out on the weekends with our friends, spend quality time with our family, choose our jobs with care and work hard to achieve our career goals and believe that we’re living. We think we’re happy. Then the demons that lurk deep in our soul that tell us we’re not good enough, we’re not strong enough, we’re not pretty enough or thin enough, we’re not enough, not enough, can never be enough, start whispering in our ear, and all of that happiness we thought we had just floats away on the breeze.

We don’t know the secret to finding happiness, and so we never do.

In his book “The Big Lie” Stan Sanderson, from the Spiritual Coach Program, tells his readers that the world is full of lies about finding happiness. We spend our whole lives working ourselves to the bone to find the happiness we think we’ve been looking for only to discover that at the end we’re just as unhappy as we were when we started. We’ve made our career, our jobs, our family our idols and spent our time pursuing them in the pursuit of happiness when we should have been pursuing a deeper, closer relationship with Christ.

We can never earn happiness. None of us are so selfless, so giving, so pure of heart, that we deserve happiness. We all have our secrets, our flaws, our dark spots. The difference is, people who have discovered the truth about finding happiness have opened their hearts to God and allowed the blood of Christ, spilled so many years ago, to wash that darkness clean. To take advantage of the pure happiness he so selflessly gave us when he sent Christ to die for our sins so that we could be washed clean of sins we couldn’t begin to atone for and therefore deserve the paradise that he has waiting for us.

God’s already given us the secret to finding happiness, through the son he sent to die. All we have to do is open our arms and accept it.

Ray Subs is a public relations specialist working with Stan Sanderson of the Spiritual Coach Program. To learn more about the Spiritual Coach Program and his book, “The Big Lie,” visit the Spiritual Coach website.

Baptism happens to be one of the most important commandments given by Jesus Christ as a common practice preached by the disciples as a ritual act. Similarly, ‘Baptism’ is a word derived from a Greek word ‘Batizo’, which means immersing or performing ablution.

However, some differences could be witnessed in the act of Baptism ranging from various ethnicities and some Christians such as the Salvation Army and Quakers do not deem it as necessary as part of their Christian belief.

As rituals and beliefs are practiced by people, gift giving becomes part of the culture as an act of friendliness and love and the arrival of a new baby is marked by great joy and enthusiasm. Therefore, there is a huge range available for gift selection and thereby making the christening ceremony one of the most memorable occasions celebrated. Looking back in time would a child realize how worthwhile and cherished his or her birth was. Hence, one best way to do that is selecting the right gift for this moment in life.

Buying a relevant gift online requires through search and the knowledge in terms of baptism gift. One of the most gifted and traditional gift is the picture of the Guardian Angel which is shown to be guiding children to cross a bridge or bestowing a hand of blessing on a baby while it sleeps.

Another or rather the second most admired gift is the Christening blanket which usually has sayings painted or embroidered on it.

Other gifts include Baptism baby jewellery, lullaby lambs (stuffed toys), customized crosses, baby bracelets, christening gowns and even customized Bibles to develop an interest in the religious script from the early ages as the child grows to reading level.

Likewise, there are not only gifts for Godchildren but for Godparents as well to cherish the precious moment to celebrate a baby’s arrival and welcome him or her to this world.

The era of progress in terms of style and art allows having different gift ideas and packages in accordance with gender. Thus, when talking about customization, there is an availability of pink Bibles for baby girls with their names written on it or blue Bibles for boys. Similarly, while buying crosses online, there is an option of availability of colour and name engravings to be done; also this option could be utilized for bracelets and keepsake boxes and cups.

Holy rosaries are made available for gifting to both Godparents and Godchildren and also a wide range for plaques and customized plates are available as gift giving where the customer gives a name to be printed on them for the very special occasion.

Gift ideas are numerous and sought easily but it’s up to you about how to make this special occasion memorable and as resplendent as possible through selection with respect to customization and picking the right gift at the right time. All religions are blessed with occasions to celebrate and make the occasion more meaningful and therefore, you can make it more resplendent with the choice of the right gift to present to the God child or the God parent.

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The First Communion is a person’s first reception of the sacrament of Eucharist and a Roman Catholic ceremony; however, it is also practiced by some Protestant ethnicities such as the Lutherans. It is usually performed at age 7 or 8.

Such a tradition includes family gatherings accompanied by the fancy dressings to celebrate the occasion. Usually a veil and white gown is worn by girls to symbolize ‘purity’. However, the type of dressing varies from culture to culture and quite lavish and expensive dressing is witnessed in some countries. On the other hand, some wear dresses passed on from elder siblings and mothers. In some cultures like in South America, boys wear military suits to celebrate First Communion while in others; a simple dress is worn with crosses adorned.

Just like Baptism, it’s a religious occasion and hence gifts of a spiritual nature are given that depict the Christian religion. These include; bible, rosaries, religious jewellery and even dresses.

First Communion gifts are usually bought from Catholic stores that deal with accessories and gifts related to the occasion. Many of these are emerging to be online stores to make gift giving and purchases more readily accessible and hassle free while being able to pick the right gift.

Many popular Communion gifts for girls include, dolls, Angel of Love pendant, First Communion customized name bracelet, prayer beads, photo frames, First Communion Watches, necklaces etcetera. Gifts for boys include almost the same type of gifts with the exception of jewellery. This gesture flaunts the faith carried on by generations showing Eucharistic themes in this religious occasion.

Since, this religious occasion is usually a characteristic of the Catholic faith and depicts it’s spiritual rituals, most relevant gifts can be found available with companies, shops and online stores which deal with the relevant items meant for this specific purpose.

With the advent of technology and just in time production system it has become easier to make more and more varieties of gifts customized. Furthermore, online stores even let you avail the option of getting the gifts wrapped and sent to the desired address and date no matter how early they have been ordered. Therefore, there is selection in terms of gifts and also the date and place where the first communion is to be held.

Mass books are given to children to evoke interest for religious studies and preach them the basics of what the faith is about. Various books have been written in this regard for the purpose of teaching Christianity thorough influential words and thought provoking images which create an interest at an early age. Similarly, religious ornaments, like the cross teach the followers of its powerful existence to fight off evil and protect from any mishaps.

First Communion is not just about celebrating an occasion and wearing a fancy dress, rather it is a time of a level of awareness at which a child realizes that it’s not just a regular bread he or she is able to acquire through the span of life but is the Eucharist bread that Christ had given his blood and soul for. For First Communion, the child should have received his Baptism earlier on without which this ceremony cannot take place and the child is required to have made his first confession before.

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What profit hath a man of all his labour which he taketh under the sun?

The Preacher’s Answer

I the Preacher was king over Israel in Jerusalem.

I made me great works; I builded me houses; I planted me vineyards: I made me gardens and orchards, and I planted trees in them of all kind of fruits: I made me pools of water, to water therewith the wood that bringeth forth trees: I got me servants and maidens, and had servants born in my house; also I had great possessions of great and small cattle above all that were in Jerusalem before me: I gathered me also silver and gold, and the peculiar treasure of kings and of the provinces: I gat me men singers and women singers, and the delights of the sons of men, as musical instruments, and that of all sorts.

So I was great, and increased more than all that were before me in Jerusalem: also my wisdom remained with me. And whatsoever mine eyes desired I kept not from them, I withheld not my heart from any joy; for my heart rejoiced in all my labour: and this was my portion of all my labour.

There is nothing better for a man, than that he should eat and drink, and that he should make his soul enjoy good in his labour. This also I saw, that it was from the hand of God. For who can eat, or who else can hasten hereunto, more than I?

What profit hath he that worketh in that wherein he laboureth?

He hath made every thing beautiful in his time: also he hath set the world in their heart, so that no man can find out the work that God maketh from the beginning to the end. And also that every man should eat and drink, and enjoy the good of all his labour, it is the gift of God.

I know that, whatsoever God doeth, it shall be for ever: nothing can be put to it, nor any thing taken from it: and God doeth it, that men should fear before him. I said in mine heart, God shall judge the righteous and the wicked: for there is a time there for every purpose and for every work.

Wherefore I perceive that there is nothing better, than that a man should rejoice in his own works; for that is his portion: for who shall bring him to see what shall be after him? Moreover the profit of the earth is for all: the king himself is served by the field.

Behold that which I have seen: it is good and comely for one to eat and to drink, and to enjoy the good of all his labour that he taketh under the sun all the days of his life, which God giveth him: for it is his portion.

Every man also to whom God hath given riches and wealth, and hath given him power to eat thereof, and to take his portion, and to rejoice in his labour; this is the gift of God. For he shall not much remember the days of his life; because God answereth him in the joy of his heart.

Better is the end of a thing than the beginning thereof: and the patient in spirit is better than the proud in spirit.

Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might; for there is no work, nor device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom, in the grave, whither thou goest.

Blessed art thou, O land, when thy king is the son of nobles, and thy princes eat in due season, for strength, and not for drunkenness! Cast thy bread upon the waters: for thou shalt find it after many days.

Give a portion to seven, and also to eight; for thou knowest not what evil shall be upon the earth. If the clouds be full of rain, they empty themselves upon the earth: and if the tree fall toward the south, or toward the north, in the place where the tree falleth, there it shall be.

In the morning sow thy seed, and in the evening withhold not thine hand: for thou knowest not whether shall prosper, either this or that, or whether they both shall be alike good.

Truly the light is sweet, and a pleasant thing it is for the eyes to behold the sun.

Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God, and keep his commandments: for this is the whole duty of man. For God shall bring every work into judgment, with every secret thing, whether it be good, or whether it be evil.

Man looketh on the outward appearance, but the Lord looketh on the heart. 1 Samuel 16:7

KJV Selection (c) by Joyce C. Lock http://iam.homewithGod.com/glimpsesofgod/ Scriptural methods of Bible study illustrated; as it is written in the prophets, they shall be all taught of God. Before you take your next vacation, consider shopping for vacation homes at: http://www.findvacationrentals.com/

In two of the four New Testament gospels we read that Jesus is born of a virgin (Mary) who was conceived by the Holy Spirit. Matthew does not give us many details how this happened and just mentions the basic facts: “This is how the birth of Jesus Christ came about: His mother Mary was pledged to be married to Joseph, but before they came together, she was found to be with child through the Holy Spirit” (Matthew 1:18).

In Luke’s gospel many more details about the background of Mary, her encounter with an angel and her relationship with Joseph are revealed. Luke explicitly mentions that Mary was a virgin (Luke 1:34: “How will this be,” Mary asked the angel, “since I am a virgin?”), that she was engaged to be married (Luke 1:27: “a virgin pledged to be married to a man named Joseph, a descendant of David.”) and that the child was not conceived by a man but by God through the Holy Spirit (Luke 1:35: “The angel answered, “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you.”).

That Jesus was to be born from a virgin through the Holy Spirit is with our 20/20 perfect hindsight completely understandable and considered a great miracle. Jesus can only be (the Son of) God if He was not just human. By having a divine Father and a human mother we can intuitively understand that He is both God and man at the same time.

And we now know that through the virgin birth the Old Testament prophecy of Isaiah 7:14: “Therefore the Lord Himself will give you a sign: The virgin will be with child and give birth to a son, and will call him Immanuel.” was to the letter fulfilled. Not only because Mary was His virgin mother. Jesus’ divinity also explains the name “Immanuel,” which means “God with us.” Since Jesus is God, that part of Isaiah’s prophecy was literally fulfilled.

But how do we know that the virgin birth account was not just added to the gospels to embellish Jesus’ birth as fulfilled prophecy and a supernatural event? It is obviously not possible for us 2000 years after this event to study any medical or other scientific evidence to support this claim. However through logical analysis combined with our knowledge of life and the culture of those days the case for the virgin birth seems surprisingly strong.

Have you ever wondered why the miracle of the virgin birth of Jesus only received limited attention in the New Testament? Yes, both Matthew and Luke briefly mention it at the beginning of their gospels, but it is not brought up again by them or any of the other New Testament books as an evidence for the Divinity of Jesus anywhere. Actually the Bible is remarkably quiet about this. Why was this great and important miracle not mentioned again and again?

For us to understand this, we need to go back to the culture at the time of Jesus. In those days a girl’s greatest asset was considered to be her sexual purity. Only a young woman who retained her virginity could expect to secure a good man for a husband. Mothers kept their daughters out of the public eye as much as possible to not expose them to temptation. A pregnant unmarried woman was considered a grave insult to the honor of her family. As still seen today in many Arab countries (whose citizens still live under the Islamic laws and culture as it was in the ancient Middle East) such pregnancies would often lead to honor killings. The father and/or her brothers, lamenting her inability to marry, could kill her to avoid the disgrace.

Against this background Jesus’ virgin birth was not heralded as a miracle. Especially for Matthew, writing about Jesus’ birth must have presented a real dilemma. As a devout Jew, Matthew’s decision to record that Joseph, representing the royal bloodline of Jesus, was not Jesus’ natural father, could open up a potential flood of compromising criticisms that Jesus was born out of wedlock. This account in Matthew’s gospel shows his unconditional commitment to writing the truth without altering any of it.

Therefore the most logical conclusion is that the mere mentioning of the conception and birth of Jesus from a young woman who was not married and still a virgin IS the compelling evidence that it really happened. If the gospels were not factual, mere legends and embellished stories, the account of the virgin birth would not have been included.

Rob VandeWeghe is a skeptic turned Christian. Rob?s book ?Prepared to Answer? and many more evidences for Christianity are available at www.WindmillMinistries.org.

From: Amit Goswami

I started writing this article on Oct 10, 2005. According to the Hindu Calendar this is a very auspicious day of pooja offering to the Goddess Durga, the divine mother. It reminded me of the spiritual culture that was India, a spiritual culture in which I myself grew up. But now India is undergoing deep changes in its socio-cultural fabric. Materialism is coming to India in a major way along with the highly touted economic growth. Can Indian spirituality survive this materialist affront let alone guide the rest of the world in its spiritual future?

My wife, Uma, and I for many years have taken groups of Westerners to spiritual journeys in India. And we have noticed changes, very serious changes in Indian spirituality during this period. When we started, there were many places of India where we could take our group to get a glimpse of what it means to live in a spiritual culture. The biggest change that we have seen in these years is that now there may be only two or three major places left in the entire sub-continent where such a glimpse is available. In most places, temples and ashrams notwithstanding, spirituality has been commercialized, quite unable to thwart the onslaught of tourism and vices of material affluence and global economics. From this perspective, the spiritual future of India, like that of the rest of the world, does not look very bright.

At first sight, it may also seem that we should blame everything on capitalism–American style, globalization and all that. But I submit this would be a short-sighted conclusion. I submit all that is taking place in India and in the West right now is a part of an evolutionary movement of consciousness–East-West integration.

Integrating East and West

In early last century, we would have seen the conflict of science and spirituality as one between West and East. The Western cultures ignored the spiritual and the Eastern cultures ignored the material–the domain of science. The poet Rudyard Kipling wrote:

East is East, and West is West

And the twain shall never meet.

And this was true then. West was already a scientific culture, but the Easterners stubbornly held on to their spiritual cultures and it seemed they would never budge. Of course, many people still believe that this is so. Alas! The East is now also rapidly giving way to a materialist culture.

From: Amit Goswami

Eastern spirituality fundamentally professes oneness of consciousness and spirituality was a way of life for Easterners. But in the Western old science, consciousness is assumed to be brain-based, to be individual by nature, and to be conditioned (via biological and socio-cultural evolution) to operate on the survival of the fittest kind of competitive individual mode.

But rapid change is under way. A brain-based consciousness conflicts in a major unsolvable manner with quantum physics. So science is undergoing a paradigm shift. In this new paradigm, the Eastern model of oneness of consciousness is found to be the right way to think about consciousness. Thus this paradigm is paving the way for an integration of science and spirituality, of modern West and the old East.

There is another subtle conflict between the Eastern and the Western approach to life. Easterners, by and large, consider spirituality as the goal of their lives. It is believed that the individual “soul” (a deeper level of conscious identity beyond the ego of one life) reincarnates many times. Only when the soul learns the secret of its spiritual being of oneness…

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A general dictionary defines recession in many ways like, “A period of an economic contraction, an extended decline in business activity, a general global slump that will last several months or years,” and so on. Recession is a time when economic disasters start, stock markets go haywire, mighty organizations drop to their knees, jobs get cut worldwide, best practices become worst practices, and so on. And, not to be left behind, the media and management gurus also go high pitched with their own theories of why things failed, whose heads should roll, who should be lynched, statistical gymnastics, witch hunts, etc. During such times you may ask, why on earth do the so called business best practices that gave abundance and happiness till now suddenly became worst practices? For this people may say it is because the universe is a random, chaotic dance of meaningless happenings. This may seem true, because we see several personal and singular disasters that just don’t make sense. But, on an overall scale, underneath all the chaotic occurrences there are hidden reasons and purpose to all things that happen around. Coming back to the main topic, though economists, business leaders and rationalists often believe the creation (and elimination) of recession, meltdowns and global business downturns are completely under man’s control, it is not entirely true. There is actually a higher supernatural power in charge, and it is necessary to understand the hidden spiritual reason why mankind goes through phases of abundance and famine. Though rationalists and scientists may chew your head off for attempting such a non scientific explanation, it is also not possible to dismiss it entirely. Modern men fear turning towards religion and spirituality for answers because it attracts ridicule. Refusing to believe in the supernatural does not make it a lie. But if one is willing to set rational logic aside for the moment and look at any option that will give some answers, then you will get some explanations.

Science and rationalism may somehow explain how disasters happen in the universe, but it cannot explain why they happen. And that “why” reason is well documented in most religious books, but not easily available inside most management or economic books. Almost all religious books from centuries have explained why mankind goes through troubling times and disasters, but perhaps the best explanation of how and why recession occurs is given in the Jain mythology. According to Jainism the world goes through a relentless cycle of positive and negative phases called Sushama and Dushama, (and their combinations), which can be used to understand a recession.

A perfectly good phase is called Sushama Sushama (extreme happiness). This is the phase of a feel good factor when businessmen believe they are invincible, organizations make enormous profits, customers are in plenty demanding better and better services, willing to pay premium for goods and services, etc. People easily talk about fashionable things like the sky being the limit, firing on all cylinders, nerves of steel, etc., and keep doing things at a reckless pace. Businesses start believing they are capable of everything and start mergers, hostile takeovers, diversification, etc. Frequent success in one field also gives them a false confidence to try their hand in areas they are not experienced with. Businessmen and the public start believing that if one pours enough money, then anyone can become successful in any business. So individuals and organizations start developing many tentacles in the hope to give end to end service, or have a stake in every stage of the value chain, etc. For example, successful steel companies may start software industries, while software industries may try their hand in television sets, oil manufacturers start peddling agricultural products, etc., in the name of diversification. The mantra is growth, growth and growth.

Slowly a small tilt occurs and it enters into a phase called Sushama Dushama (happiness with some unhappiness). This starts because when things go higher and higher, common sense and moderation takes a backseat, and greed takes over causing the bubble to expand beyond what it should. This is a phase when businesses slowly start feeling the pinch with revenues going down, and entering into a phase of slowness.

Soon it enters into a phase of Dushama Dushama (extreme unhappiness) when the bubble finally bursts and everything starts going bad, a period which we call recession or depression. This is a phase where everything that was good earlier will seem now bad. The very factors that were bringing successes earlier will now bring failures. Best practices will now seem like worst practices. Suddenly every safe investment and practices become risky. The very foundations of every business thought and practice that worked so well earlier now gets ridiculed, questioned and insulted. All the business heroism will suddenly vaporize and people enter into a state of panic leading to abrupt cost cutting by putting sudden brakes on everything. The mantra now is freeze, freeze and freeze. This, in turn, will lead to a situation like a car pileup on a on a highway due to an accident. Mighty businesses fall down like nine pins and billionaires get wiped out for inexplicable reasons. The trigger for this phase often starts in rather mysterious and unpredictable ways like, for example, creating a 9/11, a dot-com burst, a bird flu, or a sub prime crisis that no one could have imagined or prevented.

Slowly, after some agonizing months or years, it enters a phase called Dushama Sushama (unhappiness with some happiness) where rays of hope start appearing again and things get better. Eventually things improve to good old days of Sushama Sushama, but only for a short period of time. And the cycle starts again as it is an eternal never-ending process, a law of nature that every human should accept. In short, these phases keep humans from becoming too confident and arrogant of their capabilities. There is no escaping from this mighty circle. It is nature’s way of moderating things, letting the steam out or throwing a spanner in the works when it is necessary to do so. In fact, if you observe closely such feast and famine cycles are already visible all around us. For example, flowering trees goes into full bloom and then slowly loses all its leaves and flowers, only to start all over again. And no amount of watering or fertilizers will ensure the flowers remain intact all the year round. Similarly, humans have to learn to endure periodic positive and negative phases, no matter how hard they try to avoid the negative phase.

Finally we can conclude this article with a couple of quotes that can teach us how to handle a recessions and meltdowns.

“If you are going through hell, keep going.” - Winston Churchill

“When humans are too happy, even the gods are jealous.” - Old jungle saying

Thejendra BS is an IT manager and author of Disaster Recovery & Business Continuity, Practical IT Service Management, LIFE 365 and Corporate Wardrobe ? Business Humor Series. Visit his web cave http://www.thejendra.com to buy these popular books and read his other unique articles.

From the foundation of the first church of San Fruttuoso di Capodimonte to the apogee of the Abbey

When one speaks of San Fruttuoso with someone who knows this splendid locality on the promontory of Portofino, few are aware that the complete name of the nuclear abbey of this little village is San Fruttuoso di Capodimonte. Capodimonte explains the name; San Fruttuoso explains the legend which we will briefly relate.

Arriving from Spain, the priests Giustino and Procopio of Terragona wanted to reach the coast of Liguria and bring the bones of San Fruttuoso, the archbishop of Braga and founder of monasteries in Spain and Portugal. He would later be mart yered in 262.

A strong tempest surprised them in the area of Portofino and it was here that an angel of the Lord appeared to Giustino and promised to bring him to safety in a narrow’avine in the cliffs and from which he would chase away a pestiferous dragon. The priests would then have to construct a church there among the rocks by a gushing spring.

It was thus that the locality where the church was constructed and later the monastery, first of thefollowers of Saint Colombano and then of the Benedictines, came to be called San Fruttuoso. Here the Abbey that was to have such great importance for the Tigullian Gulf until the twelfth century developed.

The Abbey exercised rights over hunting and fishing on the entire promontory and in addition fostered agriculture, mostly on the eastern slope of the promontory of Portofino which was more suitable for cultivation.

The submission of many coastal and inland parishes reaching as far as the dio- ceses of Tortona, Bobbio, and Brugnato, were the consequences of many donations. Anticipating the fatal year 1000 that was supposed to represent the end of the uorld, many feudal lords and even emperors deprived themselves of land to be given to the church.

In particular the empress Adelaide or Adalgisa of Bourgogne must be remembered for having donated the land of the “oltregiogo”(1) for her spiritual salvation and that of the emperor Otto I and in appreciation for the physical salvation of her son Otto II’s escape from a grave danger. Even the island of Sestri Levante belonged to the Abbey and so we can confidently talk about its supremacy over the lands of Tigullio.

Since San Fruttuoso belonged to the “marca januensis”(2) constituted by Berengario II in 950 and entrusted to the Obertenghi family, the relationship between the Abbey and the aristocracy was such that the existence of numerous feudal landlords such as the Fieschi, the Este and the Malaspina did not pose a serious danger to the Abbey. The Fieschi were established in eastern Tigullio while the other two were dominant in the Appenine mountains and in the Po valley and plain.

The year 1133 is a very important date in the history not only of the Genoese church but for the abbey at San Fruttuoso as well. Since Pope Innocent Il separated the diocese of Genoa from the seat of Milan, establishing it as an archdiocese with Siro II, it became necessary to reorganize the territory.

Read the full article at the Tabloid of Portofino.

Spiritual teachings

Spirituality and religion address the ultimate mystery—our existence. Are we the only creature that can ponder these questions: Where did we come from? What are we? What is reality? How can mind and consciousness emerge from body and brain? What survives death? The explanations have led to the recurrent wars between deduction and faith, science and religion, and materialism verses spirituality propagating corpses of dogma littering countless battlefields. The conflict between science and spirituality can be bridged by understanding the deeper meaning of 21st-century scientific discoveries, which reveal that our world is a blending of mind and spirit.

Our world was explained by religions and spiritual teachings millennia before science described atoms and molecules. Spiritual and religious teachings generally agree that we humans cannot comprehend reality, which usually includes God. In general, religions teach that God and mystical reality are different from what we experience in ordinary consciousness. What do scientists say?

Science and dogma

We live in a scientific age, and many people find their spiritual and religious beliefs beaten down by scientists. Generally, scientists avoid proclaiming absolutes. Such dogma usually ends as additional corpses on battlefields. Historians recorded numerous examples of famous scientists’ dogma. One example was in the 1600s when Galileo Galilei attacked Johannes Kepler for asserting that the moon affects the tides—calling the notion paranormal and childish nonsense.

Professor Richard Dawkins is a highly respected British biologist who has made numerous scientific contributions. I fully respect him and these contributions. The dogma Dawkins asserts is that God does not exist—that it is a delusion. Dawkins criticizes those who use the word “God” in a non-theist manner—including numerous renowned scientists such as Einstein. Let’s examine Dawkins’ delusion. Interestingly, his book devotes only one chapter of ten to “why there almost certainly is no God” amounting to only 12% of the pages. I find that most of that chapter does not deal with the chapter’s title.

Dawkins expounds “cranes” which he defines as “explanatory devices that actually do explain.” He seems to rest his case on the crane of Darwin’s explanation of evolution. Dawkins admits there is no equivalent crane in physics. He does have faith, however, stating: We should not give up hope of a better crane arising in physics…” What might this hope be based on? In the above mentioned chapter, Dawkins devotes three pages to the “multiverse theory.” This is a hypothesis scientists use to explicate some of the stickier problems in explaining our world where numerous or even an infinite number of other universes exist “out there.” He does not convince me that this is less outrageous then spiritual or religious teachings.

The Dawkins delusion

Dawkins bristled when he was condemned as “nineteenth-century.” He points out that Darwin’s explanation of evolution is from this period and that he is proud to be associated with it. However, materialism is also of this era. Dawkins claims science utilizes reductionism based upon fundamental particles: “it is a beautifully simple idea that all things are made of fundamental particles…” This illustrates that he, like many people, clench the delusion of materialism, a dogma which needs to be recognized as just another corpse on the battlefield because our world cannot be explained with mere matter. What physicists call “fundamental particles” actually have smaller components which scientists cannot agree on as to their make up, names, or character. String theory is one such explanation for the fundamental components of the universe—everything is made up of strings of energy a billion trillion times smaller than fundamental particles.

A new truth emerging

Scientists’ materialism rationalized chastising religions and spirituality for teaching outlandish concepts. Now the tables are turned. A decade ago, scientists realized that 96% of our world is missing. It isn’t that they misplaced it; it is that despite an arsenal of sophisticated scientific instruments they can’t find the mysterious dark energy and dark matter which are needed to explain their latest theories on the universe.

Early in the twentieth-century scientific discoveries and conjectures turned science on it head with the findings of an expanding universe and a quantum theory that is still not understood. The revelations of the 21st-century are again forcing scientists to discard prized theories and beliefs. The new mysteries include dark energy, dark matter, the multiverse, and the “stuff” in a vacuum. Scientists agree that energy is an apt metaphor for what is out there—just as religions and ancient spirituality taught. A growing number of scientists venture further and exhort the universe is mental and spiritual. This is part of the bridge between science and spirituality.

Leo Kim, Ph.D. was a research associate at MIT, scientist, and executive in the biotechnology industry. He studied with healers such as Barbara Brennan, Bernie Siegel, and Deepak Chopra, and is a certified clinical hypnotherapist. To learn about his new book, Healing the Rift, visit: Healing the Rift.