Aloysius

[toastofthetown]

What are your thoughts on the name Aloysius? I'm not sure if it's more expected in a devout Catholic family rather than a non-religious household. I think Ally would be cute nickname, and makes the name more accessible as it fits in with the more popular Alexander and Alastair.

Thats my dogs middle name

You'd get some stick round here for a name like that

@ESGdance The other siblings names are,
Cornelian
Danny Boy
Candy star
Blessing
Raven Blue
Lovely people.

[quote jesusmaryjosephandtheweedonkey]@ESGdance The other siblings names are,
Cornelian
Danny Boy
Candy star
Blessing
Raven Blue
Lovely people.[/quote]

@midsomermurderess

It calls to my mind the Catholic school in Glasgow. Rather different from 'pretentious'.

Same

I should say that I do like the name - extreme Catholic upbringing here.
I prefer it to Louis and even more so Lewis. My dad claimed St Aloysius was the patron saint of insubordination, probably why I have a good feeling about it. I'm sure it was James Joyce's middle name, and there must be a zillion great role models.

I like it, though I seem to be in the minority.

@BingBongToTheMoon

No he doesn’t have an Aloysius.

Give him time

It's a bit of a mouthful. I'm not a fan.

At my school, the name was almost always pronounced A-loyz-yus. The reason was given that among a certain section of the "upper classes" spellings like these were used to deliberately trip up the unitiated, as a cruel kind of test. They included Cholmondely (Chum-lee), Featherstone-Haugh (Fan-shaw), StJohn (Sin-jun) and Aloysius (Al-ow-ish-us).
Within our very humble and downright poor school/church community St Aloysius Gonzaga was the patron saint of young people and normalising the phonetic reading of the name meant that newcomers didn't feel excluded.

I have a few friends with it as their middle name - Irish & Scottish catholic families. The local catholic primary I grew up near was always called "St Ali's"

Will it make a comeback? I doubt it. I would assume you were a very devout catholic.

Awful. It’s my Dad’s middle name. He hates it and, if anyone asks, says he has no middle name.

He does have an Irish, catholic background

A step too far, I think.

Definitely has to be said full on Cork and shortened to wishie. I like Arlo though. If you like Cork names, jeremiah shortened to Miah and Cornelius shortened to Conn or Neil are excellent.

It's not often I'm flabbergasted, but that is awful!

Names in a similar vein like Thaddeus and Cornelius are fine, but there's something about Aloysius that makes me wince. Sounds too pious and pompous...and too hissy.

@StrychnineInTheSandwiches

Names in a similar vein like Thaddeus and Cornelius are fine, but there's something about Aloysius that makes me wince. Sounds too pious and pompous...and too hissy.

I love Cornelius but Aloysius and Ignatius were the kind of names lads picked as confirmation names just for a laugh.

Ha! Yes, they'd go for something like Aloysius for a laugh or something like Sylvester because they loved the Rambo films

Aww I had an uncle Al. Nice man.
I prefer traditional Catholic names like Cruz and Rocco, that sound more modern.

@SwedishEdith do confirmation names get used beyond the confirmation, ie will the boys be regretting picking out there names later?

Nah, confirmation names don't really feature in a person's life beyond the day itself. Maybe once every 5 years you'll have a 'oh what name did you pick?' conversation with other Catholics. But that's about it.

I thought that might be the case at switch point it's funny to the of the daftest name you could find at the time

It's the middle name of thousands of Irish men who are now aged 80 and up. First name of hundreds.

I would know how to pronounce it, but I'm Irish and Catholic and also a fan of Elvis Costello.

I like it - it's old mannish but not the usual Alfie, Archie, etc. Naming trends came and went in other countries too...

It's not Gaelic. The modern German equivalent is Alois, and other equivalents are Ludwig, Louis, Lewis. It's a Latinization of those names.

It's Ignatius Loyola and Aloysius Gonzaga ( to the poster who thinks of Loyola).