I was named after a tugboat.
Seriously.
I was born in the late 1950s and many
girls I went to high school with shared that tugboat’s name: Cheryl Ann.
Apparently in the mid 1950s there was a popular show called “Waterfront” which
starred Preston Foster as the captain of the L.A. Harbor tugboat.
To this day, whenever I run across a
woman who appears to be around my age and whose name is Cheryl, I can almost be
certain that her middle name is Ann. In fact, I spoke at a recent conference
and while signing books was asked by a woman if my own middle name was Ann. Her
nametag identified her as a “Cheryl” and we immediately connected. A chuckle
erupted between us and our heads nodded in agreement. Yep, we were each Cheryl
Ann.
How we choose to name our children is
important. In her new book “The Catholic Baby Name Book,” Patrice
Fagnant-MacArthur takes that importance very seriously.
With more than 10,000 names,
Fagnant-MacArthur covers a lot of ground. Flipping through the pages I found many
of the boy’s names very interesting. (Since I am the mother of all boys I tend
to hone in on boy stuff but do see that the girl’s names are also intriguing!) All
named for saints, unique names such as Ennodius and Magenulf are included. The
author also lists, in many instances, all the variations of a name. For
instance, Makael, Makaio, Makal, Makel, Makis all direct the reader back to
Michael which indentifies him as a saint from the New Testament and then gives
additional variations of the name along with some more famously names St.
Michael’s like St. Michael the Confessor. The entry concludes with a few
sentences about St. Michael the Archangel.
Fagnant-MacArthur does have directions
for how to use the book and since she used “Elizabeth” as an example—and
Elizabeth is one of my favorite names and the name of my fiction book
(Elizabeth: A Holy Land Pilgrimage), I forgive her for not having my own name
within the pages!
The book itself is over 500 pages and
really is a fun book to read through. I would definitely give this book at baby
showers and in some ways am disappointed that it is called a “baby name” book
because I think it would be a great book for kids preparing for their
confirmation and needing to find “cool” saint names. Nonetheless, I applaud
Fagnant-MacArthur for this massive undertaking and highly recommend this book
to have and to give.
