I knew a couple that was trying for years to have a child. One night he told me they were feeling quite desperate about the whole thing and it was even affecting their marriage.
I suggested praying to the Blessed Mother and they both told me they did. Often. They said they held hands and prayed just about every night to the Blessed Mother for their marriage and a child. And guess what? It helped their marriage and they got pregnant. Hooray.
Due to some minor complications, they continued praying to the Blessed Mother for their child’s health every day and night. The night before they delivered they told me they prayed to the Blessed Mother. And the next day they had a baby girl. And they named her…well let’s just say not Mary. Not Maria or any variation of Mary. In fact, I looked up the name later and there’s no saint at all with that name. I asked where they got the name and my buddy’s wife said they just liked the sound of it. I, of course, smiled and said the baby was gorgeous.
Monsignor Bassano Stafferi is clearly beyond just smiling through it:
An Italian bishop has called on parents to stop giving their children “ridiculous” names and revert to traditional Christian names instead.
Monsignor Bassano Staffieri, retired bishop of La Spezia in Liguria, said that of the 500 girls born in the city this year, “not one was registered or baptised with the name Maria”. He added.”A name is not just a sound, it has a profound meaning.”
Mothers and fathers “should return to using a name like Maria, which is inspired by the Virgin Mary”, instead of opting for “exotic or strange names of which their children will later be ashamed”, the bishop said. There were signs that parents were reverting to traditional names for boys, “but this is still not the case with baby girls, alas”.
He said the reason was not so much that Italian families were abandoning the Catholic faith but rather that they did not give enough thought to baptismal names. “The problem is they do not think about what they are doing”.
The last few years we’ve seen an influx of silly baby names in direct proportion, I guess, to the number of silly adults running around. I think less silliness and more seriousness is my prescription for this foundering age. (This blog is of course excluded)
God bless the good bishop for saying the truth. Maybe it’ll give some folks pause and prevent another kid being named after fruit or some name that essentially begs for a hellish high school experience.
December 2, 2008 at 11:51 am
kat: “I am NOT a trendy name person as you can tell from my kid’s names: William, Mary, Margaret, Charles, Timothy and Baby Sunshine.(we do an in-utero name before birth and baptism, she will be Julia)”
Great choices! Very dignified – and very royal. 😉
I recall one BBC article that reported the names a man gave his five daughters: Candy, Caramel, Cookie, Peanut, and Popcorn. Sadly, the man in question was from my corner of the world – the Philippines – where giving odd names to children is something of a national pastime. One of our most senior senators bears the lofty moniker of “Joker” – and that’s not even a nickname!
It’s really sad that the venerable practice of naming girls “Maria [x]” (e.g., Maria Catalina, Maria Elena, Maria Caridad), in honour of our Blessed Mother, appears to have died out after my generation (and I’m only in my mid-twenties!), supplanted by a predilection for faux Western names that no self-respecting Westerner would dare curse his offspring with.
December 2, 2008 at 12:43 pm
My wife and I named our daughter Mary, and I can’t tell you how many people are startled by it. The wierd is the norm now…
December 2, 2008 at 1:19 pm
Yeah.. our Anne Marie and Cecilia Rose either get “How unsual!” or “That was my grandmother’s/Aunt’s/Cousin’s Name! I didn’t know it was still around!”
Except among our normal millieu (Catholic Homeschoolers).. Where old fashioned saints names are… normal.
December 2, 2008 at 1:32 pm
Where did they think the names went?
December 2, 2008 at 4:36 pm
We have a stained glass window in our church in honor of St. Cunegunde and her husband St. Henry. In fact, a friend of my grandmother’s was named Cunegunde Messenschlager. I guess that works in Germany!
December 2, 2008 at 4:37 pm
A few years ago, my wife and I went to England with our 2 boys when they were aged 3 and 1. My wife was newly pregnant with baby # 3.
Traveling with toddlers is challenging enough, but you have to know my 2 boys to know that this trip quickly turned into a mistake. Boys are … well … boys, and my boys take that to an extreme. We needed a break from boys with baby # 3.
During my pilgrimage to the Shrine of Our Lady of Walsingham in Norfolk, England, I prayed to the Blessed Mother that baby # 3 would be a girl (I realize now that it was selfish to pray for a particular sex for the child, and I should have been satisfied with a prayer of thanksgiving that we had been blessed with children at all). Now, I know that the sex of the baby had already been determined at that point, but I nevertheless promised that if the baby turned out to be a girl that we’d name her after the Blessed Virgin.
Baby # 3 did turn out to be a girl … her name is Mary Virginia.
December 2, 2008 at 4:41 pm
Also, I have another story on this subject. The very orthodox priest who baptized my boys had a rule that if the parents didn’t give their child the name of a saint, he’d append the name “Mary” or “Maria” to the child at baptism … regardless of the sex of the child.
I saw him do that on at least one occasion where the child had been given an “interesting” first and middle name by the parents.
December 2, 2008 at 8:19 pm
“Also, I have another story on this subject. The very orthodox priest who baptized my boys had a rule that if the parents didn’t give their child the name of a saint, he’d append the name “Mary” or “Maria” to the child at baptism … regardless of the sex of the child.
I saw him do that on at least one occasion where the child had been given an “interesting” first and middle name by the parents.”
I think that is/was standard for some countries. At least that’s how the name Sebastian got into my dh’s family tree.
May I also put in a word for us who like unusual names that are also saint names? My daughters are Zelia (for St. Zelie) and Siobhan (the Gaelic feminine for the beloved disciple).
December 2, 2008 at 8:30 pm
OH, the joys of odd children’s names. Even before we got orthodox about the Faith, I was determined NOT to give trendy names. Turns out the Big Girl’s name (one that is Irish and in honor of my grandmother – her first name is Big Girl’s middle, and Big Girl’s first name is one Nana wanted to name her own daughter) was one of the most popular girl names of 1998.
Little Girl’s name is also popular (not sure if her first name is a saint, but I’ll give away that her middle name is Marie). Travel Man picked her name out, but it’s a normal kind of name.
A friend of mine is due with baby #7, and she’s told us that at the delivery of #4, the nurse said, “Oh, your kids have such pretty names. Where do you get them?”
She answered, “Well, there’s this book called the Bible, and a list of people called the Saints. We get them there.” LOL!
Now, for the horror stories, and I worked in public schools for five years. Mind you, it was ten years ago, so it’s been a while and the strange names have increased exponentially since then, but here goes:
*Disney (living near Orlando – poor girl!)
*Talon
*L’Areal (yes, for the shampoo; no, not spelled right)
*Dakota (sorry, I’ve never gotten into that as a name – to me, it’s a truck or a state)
*my grandmother went to school with a girl named “Iona Hatt” (so it’s not new, just more widespread)
*my sister has put down for a birth certificate “Yellowjello” I s*** thee not.
I think it’s sad, especially for the children. (How would you like to have grown up with initials like B.O.?) I mean, these silly people don’t think about the fact that they are naming a human being! It’s like a funny game, or a joke. Why else would you see people actually name their kids ESPN and NASCAR? Skyy (vodka)?
If we were ever blessed to be able to expand our family and choose names, we’ve got some beautiful family (and saintly) names picked out, but we aren’t sure if and when we might get a chance to use them.
December 2, 2008 at 9:16 pm
There are so many saints with wonderful names, and there are also names with wonderful meanings – I know it’s ‘out of fashion’ now, but Theadora means “gift of God” and Thea is I think a really cute nickname that works both for kids and adults.
If somebody has an actual, valid reason, I’m much more accepting. I know someone who was going to put her foot down on Rahab as a confirmation name, but the girl who chose it actually chose it for wonderfully faithful reasons, so she allowed it.
~Zee
December 3, 2008 at 2:19 am
Yo, my name’s Jesus Shuttlesworth and when my son, Denzel Spike, hits Montesorri here in Crooklyn, not one of those Gwyneth teacher aides better, ever address his fine Nubian self as “Hey, SOOS!”
My queen, Latifa Shuttlesworth, currently harbors our second in her fecund self, Arinze Firenza, in utero. Lord have mercy, Peccata Mundi too.
December 3, 2008 at 4:22 am
I am a traditional guy and was hoping to give my father the honor of having his grandson share his name. My wife wasn’t especially keen about the name Jonathan Wayne. I suppose it didn’t help that I suggested we nick-name him ‘Duke’.
My wife’s good sense prevailed and our son now has two middle names (both saints). Dad will have to wait for the next boy…
December 3, 2008 at 6:19 am
The problem with not allowing non-canonized names is that we’ll have ever more saints with all the same names. One of my brothers in religion was born with the name Thor. He chose the name of a fine old Doctor of the Church for his confirmation name, but I think it would be great to have a Saint Thor one of these days. Or a Saint Dakota for that matter.
Yes, some names are just stupid. (Abcde? Really?) But as we’ve pointed out, some canonized saints sound pretty dumb in English, too. Barsanuphius, anyone?
Didn’t think so.
December 3, 2008 at 4:47 pm
My daughter’s friend is a nurse in Maternity. She enter the room of a new mother and said, Hi, I will be taking care of you and your new baby Dynasty.” She was promptly corrected. “My baby’s name is not Dynasty, it is D Y Nasty.” What kind of life is this little girl going to have?
December 3, 2008 at 9:08 pm
“What kind of life is this little girl going to have?”
One where she ends up like her mother.
December 4, 2008 at 4:39 am
Hey, what about St. Kateri or St. Bahkita? Unusual, but still saints!
Also, I like my Dad’s name, which is the Greek form of Elijah–He was named Elias! Two of my nieces have children named after him–Elias (boy) and Eliah (girl).
Unusual, but godly. Responses?
December 5, 2008 at 1:58 am
That’s the thing. Elias is a derivation. Derivations open up a whole new spectrum. I could see going for a Katerina if that could be a derivative of Kateri or am I was off.
I don’t see how I could do Bahkita. Sorry.
I do like Eliah though.
December 22, 2008 at 7:45 pm
Now I have further reason to be glad for naming my daughter Maria, who was born this past August. I had wished to name my son Benedict, but my wife preferred otherwise. In the end it is St. Pope Zachary who would get the nod.
Kudos for traditional names.