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Post by adamcsc on Apr 10, 2021 18:05:23 GMT
homeschooldad, it's important to remember that Old Testament saints ARE considered Saints by the Church, but this is more noticeable in the eastern church (St. Elias Maronite church, for instance) By the way, my great grandma, Baptist Sunday school teacher (born with an American Indian surname, to boot), was named "Mary". Mary, seems to be pretty common across the board in Christianity. Marie, Mary, Maria. My family, by the way, has so many people with some form of Mary on either side, that I have to believe it's pretty close to the most common female name is just about every Christian culture.
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Post by homeschooldad on Apr 10, 2021 19:31:31 GMT
homeschooldad , it's important to remember that Old Testament saints ARE considered Saints by the Church, but this is more noticeable in the eastern church (St. Elias Maronite church, for instance) By the way, my great grandma, Baptist Sunday school teacher (born with an American Indian surname, to boot), was named "Mary". Mary, seems to be pretty common across the board in Christianity. Marie, Mary, Maria. My family, by the way, has so many people with some form of Mary on either side, that I have to believe it's pretty close to the most common female name is just about every Christian culture. I do realize this, even though it is fairly uncommon for Catholics to refer to OT saints as, for instance, "Saint Moses" or "Saint Adam". I was just thinking in terms of Catholics, at least in the Western tradition, having historically taken their names either from the NT or from post-NT saints of the Church. OT names for Catholics were comparatively rare --- I recall reading in some traditionalist fever swamp that someone had an issue with Father Malachi Martin having an OT given name, this, of course, coupled with anti-Semitic mutterings that are common in such swamps. More simply put, 100-200-300 years ago, Catholics rarely had OT names, and names were almost universally taken from the NT or post-testamentary Church history.
The name of Mary is pretty well widespread, as you note, among Christians of all stripes, though I seem to recall that there was some reticence among the Irish to name their daughters Mary --- to them, it just didn't "seem right", similar to how people in Anglophone cultures almost never name their sons "Jesus". In Latino cultures it is very common.
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Post by homeschooldad on Apr 10, 2021 20:56:14 GMT
And I know a friend from my old hometown (African American) might not like me sharing my amusement at this --- or she might be okay with it, she was pretty mellow --- but she had a sister named Kelva.
You see, they had just bought a refrigerator, and... it was a Kelvinator...
There are far more outlandish names among people of all races and ethnicities.
She wasn't Catholic, in fact, her father was an evangelical preacher.
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Post by StellaMaris on Apr 11, 2021 1:49:08 GMT
In my poor estimation, these should be the names of choice for Catholic children, in this order:
Saints' names (from the 2000-year history of the Church) New Testament names (there would be some overlap here with saints' names, in that it is the apostolic beginning of the Church at Pentecost)
Old Testament names (this is more of a Protestant thing, I have to wonder if they subconsciously want to ignore Christian history, because, after all, 1500 years of that is Catholic/Orthodox) Possibly venerable old family names or surnames, as long as those are coupled with a saint's name Names of historical or ethnic significance, again, as long as they are coupled with a saint's name
I've never observed this as any sort of hard and fast rule. Both sides of my family have very Catholic roots and are littered with Michaels, Daniels, Davids, Sarahs. My Grandmothers name was Jesse. Traditionally that's a boys name but apparently her father after having 8 girls wanted to use that name so she got it. Eventually after 10 girls he finally got his boy and he was named Thomas. |
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Post by homeschooldad on Apr 11, 2021 2:13:15 GMT
In my poor estimation, these should be the names of choice for Catholic children, in this order:
Saints' names (from the 2000-year history of the Church) New Testament names (there would be some overlap here with saints' names, in that it is the apostolic beginning of the Church at Pentecost)
Old Testament names (this is more of a Protestant thing, I have to wonder if they subconsciously want to ignore Christian history, because, after all, 1500 years of that is Catholic/Orthodox) Possibly venerable old family names or surnames, as long as those are coupled with a saint's name Names of historical or ethnic significance, again, as long as they are coupled with a saint's name
I've never observed this as any sort of hard and fast rule. Both sides of my family have very Catholic roots and are littered with Michaels, Daniels, Davids, Sarahs. My Grandmothers name was Jesse. Traditionally that's a boys name but apparently her father after having 8 girls wanted to use that name so she got it. Eventually after 10 girls he finally got his boy and he was named Thomas. I said "more of" a Protestant thing. When I think of "Catholic names", I think of a lot of Margarets, Marys, Margaret Marys, Francis, Francis Xavier, Leo, Lucy, and so on. Incidentally, when I came into the Catholic world, I found it a little confusing that "Leo" and "Lucy" were free-standing names and not short forms of "Leonard" and "Lucille". I am well aware that Catholics have always named their children with OT names, my point was, that it has been somewhat less common among Catholics than Protestants, and even moreso, Protestants seem to eschew saints' names that are not biblical, but that are drawn from the 2000-year history of the Church. I've never met a Protestant Margaret Mary. To the point of your dear grandmother, Jesse/Jessie works for either gender, though the spelling without the "i" is uncommon for females. Jessie is usually short for Jessica, which is the feminine form of Jesse in the first place.
Catholic naming conventions are in free fall, and have been for at least the past 30-40 years. Catholics tend to follow the larger culture in this regard (as well as, sadly, many other regards, including some that are far less benign than merely wanting your child to have a nice-sounding, popular, contemporary name like everyone else does).
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Post by homeschooldad on Apr 12, 2021 15:04:08 GMT
In my poor estimation, these should be the names of choice for Catholic children, in this order:
Saints' names (from the 2000-year history of the Church) New Testament names (there would be some overlap here with saints' names, in that it is the apostolic beginning of the Church at Pentecost)
Old Testament names (this is more of a Protestant thing, I have to wonder if they subconsciously want to ignore Christian history, because, after all, 1500 years of that is Catholic/Orthodox) Possibly venerable old family names or surnames, as long as those are coupled with a saint's name Names of historical or ethnic significance, again, as long as they are coupled with a saint's name
It's very hard to think of a Catholic naming their child Leaf, River, or Sailor, but I wouldn't be surprised. The wheels are totally off the wagon as far as contemporary Catholic naming customs are concerned.
I may be reading more into this, than is actually there --- many people just "like a name", "think it sounds nice", and so on. Outside of faith and various ethnic circles, I'm not sure there is a whole lot of thought that goes into the significance or meaning of a name.
The big thing about a generation ago was Celtic- and Irish-derived names, which at the time were seen as a bit exotic and unusual (at least outside of Celtic and Irish circles), and thankfully, most if not all of these were saints' names. There seems to be no end to the ways to spell Caitlin/Katelyn/Catlin/Kaitlen/Kaytelynne/and so on. But at least it's a saint's name, and thank God for that. Outside of Ireland, no one has the slightest idea how to pronounce "Niamh" (it's "neeve", to rhyme with Steve). I didn't until I looked it up.
And the big thing now, at least among white people, are the two-syllable English-sounding names, that are used as epicene (unisex) names. Taylor, Carter, Hayden, Brayden, Hunter, Austin, and so on. The one consolation here, is that if you were to dig deeply into the hagiography of the English recusant martyrs, you'd probably find a lot of surnames that would pass the two-syllable English euphony test.
Black names, one never ceases to be amazed (at least when that "one" is white, as I am). Some of these names, even though they "sound black", actually are saints' names, or derived from Christian history --- Katrina, Latisha (Leticia), Darius, Dante, and so on. (They get spelled every which way, but as long as the name is intact, no problem.) In fact, I always just assumed that the singer Kesha was black (I wouldn't know her music if I heard it), until I learned that she is, in fact, white. I am all in favor of historically downtrodden people reclaiming ethnic pride through naming conventions, but let's just say that things get creative. And not just black people. LDS, especially in the inland "Mormon Empire" of the mountain West, have no rivals when it comes to creativity. I have had to wonder if they seek out unique names partially because they believe they will, if they live good, steadfast LDS lives, and go through the temple ordinances, eventually become gods of their own planets, and every god needs a unique name. (I am probably way overthinking that.)
Some bona fide saints' names will surprise you. In trying to choose a name for our child (we did not know his gender yet), we got the wonderful old TAN book, "Is It A Saint's Name?". Not only is there a Hannah and a Montana, but Elvis is a saint's name as well (Ailbe). Perhaps in that English martyrology I mentioned above, there is a saint with the last name of Presley. Hard telling.
And keep in mind that some surnames are saints' names. Mine is. So I guess I'd be covered if I wanted to name a daughter Strawberry Lemonade  |
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