Personal stories

Reading round-up

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When I was first having my babies, Danielle Bean was the mama of Catholic mom bloggers. She hasn’t blogged in ages — she’s now the editor of Catholic Digest, and an author and TV talk show host (!), and her kids aren’t babies anymore — but her writing helped me through those first few rough years of trying to figure out motherhood, and a lot of what she wrote is still fresh in my mind. Like this article, which I was thinking about the other day and decided to see if I could find: What’s In a Name?

Also, this post of mine was inspired by a reader’s naming dilemma on Swistle’s blog — the mom has given an update with the baby’s name, head on over to see what the new baby brother of Haven, Lark, and Tusker is named!

Baby name consultant: He likes/she likes

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A reader recently asked me for thoughts on how to find compromise names when Mom’s and Dad’s tastes are vastly different. I’ve mentioned before that I have found over and over that the absolute height of baby naming satisfaction for me is when my husband and I hit on that name that we both agree on. It might not be my very favorite name or his, but I find that I’m much happier and more peaceful with our choice knowing that we agreed on it together. I think I would actually hate it if I got my way, if my husband gave in – I want him to love his children’s names too.

But how do you find that name that you both agree on? For my reader, her preference is Joseph/John/Patrick-type names – names traditional to our faith that “don’t raise too much of an eyebrow.” Her husband loves heavy-hitting uncommon super-Catholicky Catholic names — think Church Father type-names: Polycarp, Irenaeus, Eusebius. Here are three ways I could see working with this:

(1) Nicknames—usual or unusual

To me, a good nickname can solve the vast majority of he likes/she likes disagreements. If the proposed name is too exotic for the other parent’s taste, could a friendly, “normal” nickname be tricked out of it for everyday use? Or the proposed name is too vanilla for the other parent, could a more unusual nickname be fashioned? To tone down the more exotic, Augustine could spend his days as Auggie or Gus; Ignatius as Nate; Cajetan Joseph could go by CJ. To jazz up a more common name, you could try Finn as a nickname for Francis, or Bede for Benedict (a two-for-one saint bonus here! St. Benedict and St. Bede in one little guy), or even something like Rory for Robert or Toby for Thomas Bernard.

(2) Use a saint’s full name as a first and a middle

Like Justin Martyr, Philip Neri, Peter Damian, Anthony Mary Claret (bonus points for Mary in the middle for a boy!), Charles Borromeo, John Chrysostom, Francis de Sales, Nicholas Owen, Thomas Aquinas, Thomas More, John Fisher. Totally heavy hitting but the “crazy” part is hidden in the middle. This article, which I linked to the other day, good naturedly pokes fun at the Catholic tendency to do that, but there is a reason it’s done!

(3) Otherwise compromise

There are a few different ways to do this, of course, and I’m sure you all know them already. For example, for Baby #1 Mom gets to choose the first name and Dad gets to choose the middle; next baby vice versa. Or decide together to have Dad go nuts in the middle name while Mom chooses a more conservative first name. Or find names with overlap – in this case, to bridge Patrick and Polycarp, such overlapping names might include: Augustine, Dominic, Benedict, Simon, Nathaniel, Roman, Adrian, Jude, Matthias, Sebastian, Gabriel, Thaddeus, Jerome. Names that hit you in the face with their Catholicism, but don’t require you to have read The Complete Ante-Nicene & Nicene and Post-Nicene Church Fathers Collection (3 volumes) to know who they are.

What about all of you? How have you handled the inevitable disagreements in baby naming? Do you have a system worked out (e.g., Mom names this baby, Dad the next; Dad chooses first names, Mom chooses middles)? Will you share some of the names you disagreed over?

Let’s talk about pronunciation

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I love a “correctly” spelled and pronounced name as much as the next name nerd. But in my years (and years) of reading reading reading name blogs and name books and name discussion forums, and inserting myself (invited or not) into any name discussions I hear going on around me, I’ve come to realize that I have not always been correct. Or rather, that certain “errors” I sometimes see/hear people make in regards to names are not actually as incorrect as I have believed.

One big example is Kateri.

I am familiar with the Shrine of Our Lady of Martyrs (for the North American Martyrs, including St. Isaac Jogues) in upstate New York, which is at the birthplace of our brand new St. Kateri Tekakwitha. For the life of me, I can’t remember ever hearing anyone who works there actually say the name Kateri, but I’m sure they must have in my presence a thousand times, and since I grew up knowing Kateri is pronounced kah-TEER-ee, I assume that’s how they say it. (Otherwise I’d have some memory of being jarred when hearing a different pronunciation said at the shrine, right?)

Therefore, I always knew that Kateri was pronounced kah-TEER-ee.

Then I made a friend who has a sister named Kateri, and they say kah-TARE-ee.

Then a friend named her daughter Kateri, pronouncing it KAH-ter-ee (nickname Kat, so cute!).

Behindthename.com’s entry for Kateri didn’t even venture a pronunciation, and among the people who commented the following pronunciations emerged as ones they’d heard used or assumed were correct: KAY-teree, kah-tuh-REE, kah-TAR-ie (all I think of with this is the John Wayne movie Hatari and the Atari video game system), and GAH-dah-lee, which is said to be the “authentic Native American pronunciation.”

Given all this, would you be able to say there is one “correct” pronunciation? Which one would it be, and why?

What about Gianna? St. Gianna Beretta Molla is so beloved (for good reason!) that she has a million little namesakes — first names, middle names, Confirmation names, religious names. It seems the Italian/original pronunciation is JAHN-nah, but I’m sure you’ve all heard and/or used the pronunciation jee-AH-na. Does that make the latter wrong? Not in my opinion, and I’ve got good company: My mom was taught by the Sisters of St. Joseph at the convent school she attended from Kindergarten until twelfth grade, and she remembers the Sisters — who were sticklers for every kind of rule — specifically teaching them that when it comes to proper names, no one has the market on the “correct” pronunciation.

Yes, Sister.

How do you say Kateri and Gianna? What other names can you think of that have different pronunciations? (Coming very soon, a spotlight on the grandaddy name of split pronunciation opinions: Xavier.)

Many many thanks, and an update

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You guys! I’m totally blown away by all your amazing comments and suggestions and enthusiasm, but most of all for popping over here to begin with! What fun this has been for me over the last day and a half, I’m totally thrilled that we’ve all been able to pitch in and help Simcha. I canNOT wait to see what name she and Damien end up choosing!

Which brings me to a new bit of info, which I didn’t have when I wrote the post (but I guess I should have — apparently some of her readers already knew it): Baby Fisher is a girl! So my Isaac/Solomon/Asa suggestions and all of your great ideas for a boy will have to be shelved for now.

I’m still pulling for Stella, or Esther/Miriam, or Hannah, in that order, and you’ve all contributed a lot more ideas as well, so now we just … wait. I’ll post the birth announcement here as soon as Simcha does.  🙂

In the meantime, I hope you stick around! I’d love to hear from you, either in the comments or via email, with name stories or name dilemmas or suggestions for posts. Happy weekend!

Baby name consultant: Suggestions for Baby Fisher

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I think I’ve posted a time or two about blogger/writer/mama-of-many Simcha Fisher, one of my favorites. (Find her at Patheos and National Catholic Register; she also wrote The Sinner’s Guide to Natural Family Planning.) She’s expecting her tenth born baby and has graciously agreed to let me offer some suggestions for the wee one’s name. And I’m trying not to freak out that (1) I get to offer actual suggestions for an actual baby and (2) that the baby’s a Fisher baby. (I’m also trying not to use too many exclamation points.) (!!!)

Simcha and her husband Damien have name tastes that I would characterize as kind of eclectic but consistent, and somewhat contrary, as well as Old World and elegant. Their older children are:

Lena

Dora

Clara

Moses

Elijah

Sophia

Lucy

Irene

Benedicta (“Benny”)

If I wanted to pin down their style more exactly, I might group them thusly:

A little old-fashioned, like black-and-white-movie starlets or a gorgeous antique or a hardworking immigrant: Lena, Dora, Clara, Lucy, Irene, Moses, Elijah

Old Testament/Jewish: Moses, Elijah

Currently popular or on its way there: Clara, Sophia, Lucy, Elijah

Clearly Catholic: Clara, Sophia, Lucy, Irene, Benedicta

Simcha also posted once about other names they’d considered and rejected at one time or another, which gives a further peek into their style—Alma, Ada, Delia, Beryl, Oceania, Moselle, Edith. Though rejected, they seem pretty consistent with the names they did choose.

So with all that information at hand, I have the following three suggestions for first names for each gender, in descending order:

Girl

(1) Stella

Stella has that same starlet feel to me as Lena and Dora; the same old-fashioned feel as Clara and Lucy; and as it’s part of the Marian epithet Stella Maris (“Star of the Sea”) it totally fits in with Lucy and Benedicta.

(2) Esther or Miriam

I really really like Esther for the Fishers. It’s Old Testament/Jewish, like Moses and Elijah (and I love when a name bridges two styles, as seem to loosely exist between the Fisher girls’ names and the boys’ names); it’s old-fashioned; it’s elegant. But I could see not everyone loving the –er ending of Esther with the –er ending of Fisher. If that were the case, Miriam would be my alternate for choice #2—it has similar attributes to Esther, it flows better with the baby’s surname, and it gets bonus points for being a Marian name.

(3) Hannah

Hannah is soft and sweet, like Clara and Lucy. It’s an Old Testament name, like the brothers’ names, and currently the height of popularity, like Sophia.

Boy

(1) Isaac

Simcha and Damien’s taste for boys so far has seemed pretty straightforward: Old Testament/Jewish. Simcha’s parents converted from Judaism to Catholicism when she was a child, so I’ve always assumed Moses and Elijah are nods to her heritage. Isaac certainly fits that mold. It’s also currently fairly popular, which fits in with Sophia and Clara, but old-fashioned at the same time, with its previous peak being in the 1880’s, like Lena and Dora and Moses. It’s also pretty Catholic, what with St. Isaac Jogues being one of the North American Martyrs (and the recent canonization of St. Kateri Tekakwitha helping to raise his profile even more).

(2) Solomon

Old Testament/Jewish, the end. Also wise and kingly, elegant and old-fashioned. A solid, consistent choice for a brother to Moses and Elijah.

(3) Asa

Asa is old-fashioned and Old Testament/Jewish, and it’s short and punchy like Lena and Dora and Lucy. It’s also a bold choice because of its rarity (it peaked in popularity in the 1880s), potential for mispronunciation by those who are unfamiliar with it, and potential for crossover to the girl’s side because of the –a ending. But I get the sense that Fishers would not be swayed by such considerations, and Ace is a pretty cool nickname (if a nickname were to be used).

What do you think? Have I hit the nail on the head or missed altogether? Do you have any suggestions for naming the new Fisher Baby?

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In formulating my thoughts on the Fishers’ name style and determining other names that I think they might like, I consulted The Baby Name Wizard book and web site, especially the Name Voyager and Namipedia, as well as the Behind the Name web site, and my own mind, which contains a lifetime of conversations about names, reading about names, and thinking about names. (Seriously. I never tire of it.)

Naming twins

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I came across this very cool post today: How to Name Catholic Twins.

This is totally my kind of name article. Well and thoroughly researched, with lots of commentary and references. The author, Meg, lists suggestions for twin boys, twin girls, and boy/girl twins. Name candy for sure, an enjoyable read.

Syro-Malabar Catholic naming (India)

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Swistle posted a letter the other day from a mom whose husband is Indian and a Syro-Malabar Catholic, or Syrian Catholic: Baby Boy or Girl Molly-ache-elle, Sibling to George (Gil). I’d known a little but not a lot about this Catholic community (which is in line with the Roman Catholic Church), and nothing at all about their naming traditions, until reading this post and some of the comments, especially this one, this one, and this one.

(I weighed in too — see my comments here.)

Taking a new name: One Order’s history

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I was thinking about religious names today — the names that a sister or nun, brother or priest might take as their new name upon making their vows — and came across this article: The “Sister Mary” Naming Custom, about the naming tradition of the Sisters, Servants of the Immaculate Heart of Mary (IHM).

Until 1920, the sisters of IHM had Mary as the first part of their new religious name. One list given of those received and professed includes, “Igidius, Johanna, Gerard, Liguori, Agnes, Anthony, Ignatius, Xavier, Stanislas, Colette, Gertrude, Clara, it is not necessary to say that every one had the name of Mary preceding the other name as it is customary with us.”

The first sister to have a name that deviated from this tradition was named Sr. Margaret Mary (the change being that Mary was the second name rather than the first. You know, those sisters and their adventurousness 😉 ), and “[a]fter Margaret Mary, others began to have Mary, Marie, or Maria as the second part of their name. We also began to see Latin names like Cor Mariae, Beata Maria, Maria Pacis as well as titles like Marie de Lourdes and Mary de Montfort, Marie Rosary and Mary Immaculate given as religious names.”

I just want to swoon over those gorgeous Latin names! And do be sure to read the comments, where some more names are given.

Do you know any priests or religious who took a new name, and if so, what was their birth name and what is their new name? What name would you take? If you were to include a Marian name, which one would you choose?

For more on the Sisters, Servants of the Immaculate Heart of Mary (IHM) see their web site. The Wikipedia entry was also informative.

Namers extraordinaire: Hanson brothers

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Like with the Royal baby post, this one veers a little outside of my main topic of Catholic baby naming into non-Catholic celebrity babydom. But the Hanson brothers, of MMMBop fame, and their wives have done, in my opinion, an extraordinary job naming their children.

Oldest brother Isaac and his wife Nikki have: Clark Everett (called Everett), James Monroe (Monroe), and Nina Odette (no word on whether she’s called Nina or Odette)

Middle brother Taylor and his wife Natalie have: Jordan Ezra (Ezra), Penelope Anne (Penny), River Samuel (River), Viggo Moriah (Viggo), and Wilhelmina Jane (Willa). (Mom Natalie is a name nut like us, and has blogged about the naming of her children here [first four] and here [number five].)

Youngest brother Zac and his wife Kate have: Ira Shepherd (Shepherd), Junia Rosa Ruth (Junia), and George Abraham Walker (Abraham).

There are so many things I love about their naming style. I love that they have a whole-family tradition of going by middle names — a really nice way for cousins to feel connected. I love that their collective taste is a little funky, with an often Christian spin, as seen with Biblical names James, Jordan, Ezra, Samuel, Moriah, Junia, Ruth, and Abraham. Junia is one of my favorites of their choices, and I love it followed by Rosa Ruth. I also love their adventurousness, as they seem to just choose names they want to choose.

What do you think of the Hansons’ names? Do you have examples of families whose naming you admire?

Baby on the way: Prince or Princess, and Predictions

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Will and Kate are having another baby. The internet is already atwitter with predictions for names, like last time:

Royal Baby’s Name and Sex: Bookmakers Taking Bets

Royal Baby No. 2: The Internet Reacts with Jokes, Excitement and Plenty of Baby Names

The Royal Name Game: 10 Potential Names on Prince William and Kate Middleton’s List

What Should Prince William and Kate Middleton Name The Second Royal Baby? POLL

Kate Middleton’s Baby Name Predictions From the Expert Who Picked ‘George’

But, like last time, I just can’t get too into it. Royal baby naming is so different than regular baby naming, don’t you think? I mean, it seems that they only choose from a certain pool of names, which I’m not interested enough in to even figure out what that pool is. (So says the mom who won’t stray outside of Catholic saints when naming her children. But our pool is so large!) And they string so many names together, what with the four or five middle names (or, I guess, just two, as in the case of Prince George), all of which are meaningful to them, I know, but I don’t even really know what the criteria is that they use. It certainly doesn’t seem to be flow, at least to my ear (though I think Kate and Will did really well with the flow of George’s name). And again — I’m just not interested enough to figure out what formula, if any, they all use.

But, if I had to guess, I might think of these names (first names only) as befitting a brother or sister for Prince George Alexander Louis:

Charles, Francis, Philip

Elizabeth, Caroline or Charlotte, Jane

I personally always look to family names as one of my first places of inspiration, hence Charles (Will’s dad), Francis (Kate’s dad’s middle name), Elizabeth (Kate’s middle name, her mom’s middle name, and Will’s grandmother’s name), and Caroline/Charlotte (feminine form of Charles; Carole is also Kate’s mom’s first name, and Charlotte is her sister Pippa’s middle name). I also like my sib sets to go together, to feel similar in style, hence Philip (chosen at first because I know a little George who has a brother Philip, and then I realized it’s also a family name for Will — it’s his grandfather’s name, Queen Elizabeth’s husband, Prince Philip — and a family name for Kate — her sister Philippa/Pippa), and Jane (Jane Seymour, not the greatest association, but it’s British and royal, and I like it with George). I think Francis might be the outlier here — it doesn’t strike me as a royal British name — but I’m keeping it on there anyway.

For middles, I would look again to family — any of those I mentioned above would make good candidates, as would Diana (in fact, I’d be shocked if they didn’t use some part of Diana’s name somewhere for a little girl), Spencer (Diana’s maiden name), Michael (Kate’s dad’s first name). It was mentioned that the Scottish would be happy with George’s middle name of Alexander; perhaps Margaret would make a good contender for a middle for a girl for the same reason? (It’s “still considered the Scottish national name.”)

So. If it were me naming the sibling of big brother George Alexander Louis, I’d choose:

Philip Spencer Francis

Caroline Diana Margaret

I didn’t read any of the articles I cited above before making my picks, and now that I’m perusing them … I see Philip, Caroline, Diana, Elizabeth, Charles, Charlotte from my lists; others mentioned include James and Victoria. Ok, I didn’t do too badly picking names that a royal might choose! The only picks of mine that I don’t see mentioned are Spencer, Margaret, Francis, and Jane.

And I’ll also throw out a gender prediction: I’m guessing boy, since Kate is sick like last time (prayers for her! Hyperemesis gravidarum sounds like the very Pit of Despair), and all my pregnancies have been more or less the same in regards to level of sickness, and I’ve only had boys. Very scientific assessment, I know. Be sure to check back when the baby’s born to see how I did!