The name of Nicole Kidman and Keith Urban’s new baby is not a remarkable name: it’s Faith. What makes it remarkable is the pairing of the new baby’s name with the name of her sister, which is Sunday.
Sunday and Faith. Granted, it would be VERY DIFFICULT to come up with a sibling name for a child named Sunday, and that’s one good reason not to USE a name such as Sunday. Sunday and Olivia? No. Sunday and Tuesday? No. Sunday and Genevieve? No. Sunday and June? No. Sunday and Kailey? No. Sunday and Sydney? No. Sunday and Heather? No. Sunday and Penelope? No. But I would also have said “Sunday and Faith? No.”
Sunday is a highly unusual word name, reportedly inspired by Australian Sunday Reed, in a category with names such as Pilot and Apple. Faith is also a word name, but well-known and Top 100 and traditional/Puritanical, in a category with names such as Hope and Rose. The difference in style is masked by the association of the word meanings; it’s easier to see with examples such as Tuesday and Faith, or Wednesday and Grace.
However, now what they have is not only a sibling set but a THEME, and so it would be EASY to come up with suggestions for the couple’s third child together. For a boy: Church, Bishop, Deacon, Christian, Temple, Benediction. For a girl: Trinity, Hosanna, Epiphany, Spirit, Angel, Miracle.
You’re right that Sunday is a difficult name to pair with. Thus, I think Faith is good match. I read that Nicole Kidman is a practising Roman Catholic, and that may be the reason Sunday and Faith are special words/names for her. Too, her first two children, Isabella Jane and Connor Anthony (who seem to have been abandoned to be raised by a sister of her ex-husband Tom Cruise) were adopted, so it may be that she sees her new birth children as miracles and that has increased her faith. I also read that after she met Keith Urban she prayed that God would give her a man like that. And she got him!
I’m not a fan of Faith as a girl’s name, but certainly prefer it to Sunday. And I prefer both names to a lot of names stars have been naming their babies. But most of all I love the name of Nicole’s older daughter Isabella Jane (now 18 years old).
I know a toddler named Sunday. She has an older sister named Sophia – the mom likes S names!
Swistle, this was the first I had heard of it! (And I’m a celebrity gossip whore). Way to the break the story (well, to at least this one person!)
I think Sunday and Faith are cute together.
Regarding Sunday and Sophia, I was thinking another name beginning with an S would have worked — and thought, maybe Serena, but then I remembered Siri Cruise. There have already been remarks linking the S-names Siri and Sunday, and another S-name would just add to that.
Some other options: Sunday Rose and Daisy Margaret (even though Margaret has an association with Daisy). The name SunDAY has some similar elements with DAIsy: reverse the syllables in Sunday = Day-sun –> Day-sy/Daisy, a flower name like Rose .
Or Sunday Rose and Iris Sydney (for the Australian city and because again there’s a reversal pattern with the two names).
There’s a church near here called Trinity Religious Temple Church. They could name a baby that.
;-) (I really dislike using Trinity as a child’s name — girl or boy.)
When I saw your tweet on this I thought they should have gone with Brunch instead of Faith. But I guess that’s more of a Palin name…
The name according to the Urbans have to do with what they had to hold on to through the whole process – faith. I reckon that when they look at the baby girl, the power of faith is what they will see not if it matches Sunday’s name in a theme.
Anonymous- Seems like in that case the name should be connected to the power of medical science, or perhaps to the name of their gestational surrogate.
Individually I think Faith Margaret is a terrific name. With celebrities using all of these bizarre names, I actually feel a more normal name like Faith stands out, and I prefer it to Sunday, but don’t feel Sunday is as strange as some other celebrity baby names.
I agree it doesn’t really go with Sunday, but what would go with Sunday? I’m not sure.
I think Jennifer Garner and Nicole Kidman should have consulted about their daughters’ names in advance. Violet and Faith make better sister names, and then Sunday and Serafina could be an ideal sibling pair.
Yikes… harsh feelings towards the names.
I think Sunday is a great name (espeically if the parents want the nickname of Sunny). Calendar names in America date back to the pilgrims.
And so do virtue names: Faith, Hope, Charity, Constance, etc.
Faith seems very complimentary to Sunday.
The Mrs.- Harsh? I don’t see any harsh. We’re discussing the names, and so far there have been several very positive comments and I haven’t seen anything very negative. Lots of us are agreeing that it would be very difficult to find a sibling name to go with Sunday.
Late to the discussion, but I have a name crush on Sunday, and I’ve always thought it would sound nice with another quirky word name, like Juniper or Wren.