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I'm just curious - do Irish Catholics and Irish Protestants name their children differently?
Thank you
Thank you
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Replies
Often, in my experience, yes. Religious people are more likely to go with Biblical names.
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That would include both Catholic and Protestant Irish parents, so it isn't really helpful. More to the point: Catholic parents tend to favour saints' names, whereas Protestants mostly don't know if a post-Biblical saint went by a particular name or not. But, they might avoid them in order to avoid being identified with a group they don't belong to.(The name Christiana features on two branches of my family tree, but I'm not a Christian so I didn't consider using it.)Also, since Catholics take a new name at confirmation, they are more likely to have three given names than non-Catholics, although all my children have three.
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Yes, but most Irish Catholics don't use their confirmation name - it's not seen as an official name. It's not put on forms, for example.
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Yes, sometimes, but more so in the North. There, Irish language names like Cormac or Áine are usually given to children with Catholic or Irish Nationalist parents. Saints names like Bernardette or Cecilia or Patrick would be considered Catholic also. Protestant or Unionist parents would give their children Bibical names, or just general names like Emily or Jack. The difference in naming is usually more political than actually religious. Remember that I am being very general, so this doesn't happen 100 percent of the time. In the South, you don't really have the political divide to the same extent, so it wouldn't be rare to meet a Protestant girl called Niamh or Aoife. People living in the Gaeltacht (Irish speaking parts of Ireland, like Galway), would be more likely to have an Irish name. Hope that answered your questions.
This message was edited 4/13/2009, 8:07 AM
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