Confirmation Name

Okay. When you are like twelve, the Catholics feel that you've done enough thinking and now you need DOGMA. So they do a second baptism where you get to admit it in your own voice; after that, they figure they've gotcha.

Among the various humiliations that entails preparation for this interesting ritual is the adding of an extra middle name to your records. You kind of get to choose the name; it has to be a saint, of course, and is subject to nun recall. Since my first name isn't a saint's name (they actually pitched a big fit over this, as the years wore on and my mother refused to change it), they didn't let me pick at all, and I got Bernadette. Bernadette. One of the nicer saints, all told, but YIKES! It also made my initials M.A.B.S., which got me plenty of whuppins on the playground in years to come.

That is, until I wised up, and finally understood that at least that particular Catholic Institution, in concert with the Vatican, was as far from God as you could possibly get, and flipped them all off and went to court and got rid of my confirmation name. So there.

You may want to know (in the interest of Everything's international character) that this does not happen in all countries. For example, in Italy (and, AFAIK, in France) there is no such thing.
One reason why this has not occurred to anybody in Italy is that to legally add, subtract, or change anything in your name you need a decrete by the President of the Republic, which is produced only through intense pain and expenditure in court.

At my confirmation, I almost crossed myself with my left hand. Chatechism had not been that good, you know, and I am left-handed.