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ElisabethGrace
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| Posted: Feb 17 2006 at 6:30pm | IP Logged
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Do you celebrate your family's name days? I've always wanted to do this, but keep putting it off. Where is a good place to look for the saints days? I've looked at several websites, but many have conflicting days for some of the saints.
Do you celebrate one saint name day for each child or more than one?
My children have two saints names so I'm not sure which to celebrate. Perhaps both? 
I've putzed around long enough with this, now is the time for action!
Blessings,
Angela
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guitarnan
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Name days are wonderful. We don't make a huge fuss here (there are a LOT of St. Alexanders...ds has had to choose just one!) but we do spend time each year discussing patron saints. Every year I talk about more saints and blesseds. (This month...Italian saints in honor of the Winter Olympics. I found some good southern Italian saints/blesseds on the Holy See's official website.)
I think it's a great way to grow up, knowing you're in the company of the Communion of Saints. You're never alone when you have so many friends in Heaven.
I have one Catholic friend here who has 10 children. They celebrate all birthdays once a year, in January. The big fuss is over the children's name days. It's pretty cool!
Some Protestant countries also have name day traditions (one of my favorite books, The Golden Name Dayby Jennie Lindquist, is about Swedish-Americans at the turn of the century...19th to 20th, that is). Name days are a lovely tradition!
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Nancy in MD. Mom of ds (24) & dd (18); 31-year Navy wife, move coordinator and keeper of home fires. Writer and dance mom.
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momwise
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Angela,
We've had varying amounts of success with celebrating the name days. We only have one each, for their first names. One nice way to remember the day is to use the collect (opening prayer) for the Mass of the day after dinner or at bedtime. You can get a good, comprehensive book of saints days throughout the year based on the newest calendar and use that. If you go to Catholic Culture's ligurgical calendar and click on This Month, you'll get a list of the current calendar's feasts.
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Gwen...wife for 30 years, mom of 7, grandma of 3.....
"If you want equal justice for all and true freedom and lasting peace, then America, defend life." JPII
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MaryM
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ElisabethGrace wrote:
| Where is a good place to look for the saints days? I've looked at several websites, but many have conflicting days for some of the saints. |
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This is a pretty good site for finding feast days. Conflicting dates might be occuring because the feast days have changed. There is an old calendar that has different dates that what is used currently. Also there are a couple saints with multiple days associated with them. And in a few cases different countries place the celebration of the feast on a different day than the US. Also as was mentioned, make sure to distinguish between different saints that have the same name as that may be the confusion. Here is a second saint site I use.
ElisabethGrace wrote:
Do you celebrate one saint name day for each child or more than one? |
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We celebrate only one each. While they do have first names that have patron saints they are more associated with old testament names so we have done the middle names since those saints are more primary as patrons. We tend to make mention of the other feast day but not have a "celebration." On feast days we do it pretty simple - that child gets to pick dinner that night, we have a cake or other nice dessert, and pray especially for the child together that day.
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Mary M. in Denver
Our Domestic Church
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JennGM
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Have you seen the classic book for Namedays called My Nameday -- Come for Dessert by Helen McLoughlin? It's out of print, the liturgical calendar is pre-Vatican II, but she has wonderful prayers and suggestions for celebrating namedays. Catholic Culture also has a few ideas on implementing namedays, if you do a search.
Since my ds is still young, our namedays are simple, including Mass, probably breakfast out with extended family (or lunch), and special meal or dessert, with holycard, statues or symbols at the table. I also try to find books or stories to read about our patron saints.
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Jennifer G. Miller
Wife to  & ds1  '03 & ds2  '07
Family in Feast and Feria
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ALmom
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We try to remember to light the baptismal candle and renew baptismal promises - and name of the saint is usually close to dc baptism date so we kind of combine these into one on the anniversary of the baptism.
There is a plenary indulgence associated with the renewal of baptismal promises on the date of baptism. A little ceremony is included with paper inside the candles.
Janet
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Kelly
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As usual, Jenn beat me to the punch in recommending "My Nameday, Come for Dessert" by Helen McLoughlin . Though OOP, it's worth the hunt-short and sweet, easy to look up information. I also really like "The Year and Our Children" by Mary Reed Newland, also OOP, sigh.
We celebrate birthday and name days, both, but we keep both pretty simple. We do save the presents for birthdays, but confine celebrations outside the family to the birthdays for years 5, 10 and 15 (tho some children have opted to do 6, 10 and 16!). For name days, we make a special cake of some kind, or special dessert-occasionally letting the children pick dinner, too (that's easy: pizza!). Sometimes they'll receive a little something special wrapped-up, and it's always nice if we can make it to Mass for the day. Oh yes, and depending on the saint, we use appropriate colored tablecloths (red for martyrs, green for ordinary time saints, and so on...)---always lends a festive air.
Over the years, I've definitely found that keeping it simple is the key to success in our (chaotic) household!
Kelly in FL
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Karen E.
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We celebrate name days for all family members -- usually have a fun dessert, or some kind of special treat. We talk about the saints, too. It's great fun, and a tradition worth starting!
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God bless,
Karen E.
mom to three on earth, and several souls in God's care
Visit my blog, with its shockingly clever title, "Karen Edmisten."
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4Real Forums : Domestic Church
Topic: Name Days
