How are you called?
Posted by Cody Creed on Friday, January 21, 2011
In Quebec, where I grew up, it was common to ask when meeting someone for the first time: "how are you called?" Somehow that feels seems more "real" to me. After all, a name is given by someone else; what I "call myself" expresses the essence of who I understand myself to be. But it matters - just look at all the Baby Name books that are out there!
It must make a differnce because I used my spouse's name for a while but shed it because it "didn't fit me". I have friends who call themselves by a nickname. I have friends who chose to call themselves by an animal with whom they identify, and others who use a gender-ambiguous name. I have friends who use "engendered" names -- "boy" or "girl" names -- in defiance of their biological sex I wonder if what name we use, how we call ourself, is a primary piece of understanding ourself? or claiming our place in the Universe?
In church, it's interesting that we're in a cycle of stories about being called "by name"-- often by the Divine Presence. A young boy, Samuel, hears his name being called in the middle of the night. At first he thinks it's his mentor, Eli the Priest, calling; so he runs upstairs and wakes up Eli saying "what do you want of me?" After a couple of awakenings, Eli twigs and says to Samuel that perhaps it's God calling, so "instead of coming to me say, ' Speak Lord, for your servant is listening'." Last week, the story was when Jesus heard his name called "from the heavens" and a voice saying "You are my child, my beloved." (No wonder he ran to a quiet place to work out what was that about?) And this week, it's Jesus doing the calling: Andrew a friend of Jesus, a poor working man just trying to get a living from the sea, hears Jesus calling him, by name, to come and follow to become a "fisher of people"; and he drops his nets and off he goes. It's almost like being called becomes a job description.
Julius Lester, in his book Lovesong, the story of his journey to finding himself says "We know we are 'home' when we know the name by which God calls us."
So what is it about our name that makes us who we are? does it really let us know what our place is in the Universe?
Let me know...
It must make a differnce because I used my spouse's name for a while but shed it because it "didn't fit me". I have friends who call themselves by a nickname. I have friends who chose to call themselves by an animal with whom they identify, and others who use a gender-ambiguous name. I have friends who use "engendered" names -- "boy" or "girl" names -- in defiance of their biological sex I wonder if what name we use, how we call ourself, is a primary piece of understanding ourself? or claiming our place in the Universe?
In church, it's interesting that we're in a cycle of stories about being called "by name"-- often by the Divine Presence. A young boy, Samuel, hears his name being called in the middle of the night. At first he thinks it's his mentor, Eli the Priest, calling; so he runs upstairs and wakes up Eli saying "what do you want of me?" After a couple of awakenings, Eli twigs and says to Samuel that perhaps it's God calling, so "instead of coming to me say, ' Speak Lord, for your servant is listening'." Last week, the story was when Jesus heard his name called "from the heavens" and a voice saying "You are my child, my beloved." (No wonder he ran to a quiet place to work out what was that about?) And this week, it's Jesus doing the calling: Andrew a friend of Jesus, a poor working man just trying to get a living from the sea, hears Jesus calling him, by name, to come and follow to become a "fisher of people"; and he drops his nets and off he goes. It's almost like being called becomes a job description.
Julius Lester, in his book Lovesong, the story of his journey to finding himself says "We know we are 'home' when we know the name by which God calls us."
So what is it about our name that makes us who we are? does it really let us know what our place is in the Universe?
Let me know...
Tags: name self-expression disicples samuel baptism faith journey
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