Maura loves LOVE. She loves a good wedding, too! She believes there is nothing better than gathering the people you cherish the most and asking them to be witness to your love with a beautiful ceremony – and then eat, drink, and dance together. What a joy!
Growing up in the Catholic tradition, Maura recalls being in awe of the magic and mystery of different ceremonies, feast days, and the essence of sacredness they invoked. The traditions and rituals in her own family around life, death, holidays, and other ancestral milestones felt treasured and highly important. As she grew older and discovered her love of travel, Maura began to explore different traditions and cultures, finding a spiritual practice that expanded her consciousness and rang true to her soul. This alignment to Truth and Love, as Maura calls it, is deeply individual while also deeply universal.
Maura is a yoga & meditation teacher in the Philadelphia area specializing in trauma-informed practices, community engagement and mind-body integration. She co-founded Yoga Home, a studio based in Conshohocken, in 2007 and continues to work with community partners on local, national, and international scale to support meaningful and sustainable efforts around inclusivity, social justice, international development, education and more. She is a catalyst for change encouraging reflection, responsibility, and action in our individual lives and in our deeper connection to each other and the world.
Maura loves to cook – you’ll often find her in her kitchen whipping up a new recipe – she has a knack for comfort vegetarian food, whether it’s tacos or Italian! She also loves being outdoors, whether in her garden, hiking in the Wissahickon or traveling to a new destination. She’s creative, funny, down-to-earth, and grounded. She cherishes the ‘aunt life’, time with her three sisters and their families and spending more quality time with her parents as they age.
When working with couples, Maura asks great questions, is a compassionate and skilled listener, and is deeply intuitive. She is equal parts playful and serious and brings those elements (and more!) into her work. She finds it a great privilege to be a part of couples’ ceremonies – helping them to create something beautiful and be witness to their love and commitment to one another. Maura is delighted and grateful to be a part of Journeys of the Heart.
Maura Manzo helped make our ceremony exactly what we had envisioned.
The love story she crafted for us made it sound like she had known us throughout our long journey and she was helpful with things that we didn’t even think of. She printed out our personal vows for us and brought them to the venue, met with the best man who would be passing her the rings and gave us detailed instructions about the marriage license so that we never felt like we didn’t know what we were doing.
Hi Maura,
With all of the chaos over the last few months, I wanted to thank you once more for making our wedding day so perfect. We received so many compliments about our ceremony and how personal it was. We were so lucky to find you and work with you. Thank you for making the ceremony run so perfectly and making our experience so us.
We appreciate you and thank you again!!!
We utilized Journeys of the Heart to get an officiant for our wedding ceremony on 10/08/2022. Journeys of the Heart put us in touch with Maura Manzo to officiate our wedding. We first met Maura via a Zoom chat, and she immediately put us at ease. She helped walk us through the process of constructing our ceremony. Maura listened to our wishes and then was able to offer suggestions on wording of vows and readings for the ceremony.
Maura was quick to respond to our emails and provided feedback and suggestions based on her expertise. Maura crafted a beautiful love story from the information we provided her. On the day of the ceremony, Maura contacted the venue representative and ensured the timing of the ceremony was perfected. Maura put me and my fiancée at ease. She walked us through the ceremony and made sure we knew how it would unfold. We loved how she spoke to our guests and made everyone feel welcome.
After the ceremony, Maura was very organized and had all our marriage license paperwork ready for us to sign. Maura explained the process of receiving the official license from the county.
We would recommend using Journeys of the Heart and Maura Manzo as the officiant for your wedding!
Sincerely,
