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Most Catholic families have continued the tradition of naming their children after a particular saint.
This tradition is praised in the Catechism of the Catholic Church:
The sacrament of Baptism is conferred "in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit."In Baptism, the Lord's name sanctifies man, and the Christian receives his name in the Church. This can be the name of a saint, that is, of a disciple who has lived a life of exemplary fidelity to the Lord. The patron saint provides a model of charity; we are assured of his intercession. the "baptismal name" can also express a Christian mystery or Christian virtue.
However, we don't always know much about the saint we were named after, unless it is a common saint like the Blessed Virgin Mary or St. Francis of Assisi.
Researching our baptismal saint
St. Francis de Sales highly suggests getting to know your baptismal saint in his Introduction to the Devout Life:
You will do well to choose out for yourself some individual saint, whose life specially to study and imitate, and whose prayers may be more particularly offered on your behalf. The saint bearing your own baptismal name would seem to be naturally assigned to you.
One difficulty we may run into is that our parents may not have had a particular saint in mind. They could have named us "Margaret" or "Thomas," but in reality, there are dozens and dozens of saints with the same name.
In such cases, we will simply have to choose one to research and draw close to, trying our best to imitate their example.
