“We Are Our Grandmother’s Prayers; We are Mothers of Courage” (Sweet Honey in the Rock)

I have been working on the scanning and printing and adding to my blogged life stories the baby albums of each of my children. (I had hoped) to finish it by Mother’s Day and intend to gift each of them a copy of these scanned/printed albums plus some more prints of their About Baby Books with milestones and all kinds of written babyhood details and remembrances – but it proved to be quite more of a daunting task than I imagined when I first took it on in late April.

At the bottom of this piece are scans of every baby name considered (there are check marks and notes in the baby name book that their father and I searched through) which are also part of this gift to each of them. With my first son, we had asked to know the sex from the ultrasound, so there really weren’t many girls names considered past a certain point in the pregnancy.

With my second son, we chose to be surprised!

The top two names during the first pregnancy were Zachary, meaning “Jehovah Has Remembered” and Jonathan, meaning “God’s Gift.” During the second pregnancy, had my son been a girl, his given name would have been “Elizabeth” but since he was due on January 8th or 15th (I kind of forget, I “think” it was January 8th and he was born January 3rd!…Zach’s due date was May 18th and he was born May 27th!) I had felt that if for some chance he came early, actually on Christmas Day, the name then would need to be “Natalie.”

The middle name of my oldest son is James, after his father. The middle name of my youngest son is Rodney, after my father.

The naming of a child is a holy, sacred act. While there may be some parents who carelessly name their children or do not think about aspects of meaning and significance in a name itself, I tend to think these parents are few and far between.

The act of name significance crosses cultures and faith traditions and historically, children are named with names of meaning that are usually selected to express the hopes and dreams of parents for their children. In the Bible, there are many instances of spiritual significance in names and cases of name changes made by God, for reasons of new spiritual identity. Also, children are named after parents or ancestors sometimes – it is an act of honor and an attempt for that child to carry on a good legacy of their namesake.

I intend to say more on this topic of naming in my future blog writings, here and there, but for now, this is a starter.

Last week while working through scans of my older son’s baby album (I did the younger son’s first) I was listening to Spotify. The song below came on, likely because I have another song On Children in a playlist, that is by Sweet Honey in the Rock, and this piece seems related somewhat.

The lyrics and feel of this other piece We Are by Sweet Honey in the Rock caught my attention, and I put the song on loop, taking in the words, meaning and feeling of the musical expression. While some of the sentiments below don’t match in the literal sense what one might consider biblical thought, I believe in the metaphorical space of creative expression and intention of thought and meaning, they are in keeping in line with the essence of biblical hopes, dreams and purposes for God’s giftings of Life!

All cultures celebrate life as a gift of God – some perhaps more than others and it may come out in slightly different ways and expressions. It just seems to me to be a universal spiritual experience and I thought that this song was worth sharing here.

We Are

For each child that born

A morning star rises and sings

To the universe who we are

For each child that born

A morning star rises and sings

To the universe who we are

For each child that born

A morning star rises and sings

To the universe who we are

We are our grandmother’s prayers

We are our grandfather’s dreamings

We are the breath of the ancestors

We are the spirit of God

We are mothers of courage

Fathers of time

Daughters of dust

Sons of great visions

We are sisters of mercy

Brothers of love

Lovers of life and the builders of nations

We’re seekers of truth

And keepers of faith

Makers of peace wisdom of ages

We are our grandmother’s prayers

And we are our grandfather’s dreamings

We are the breath of the ancestors

We are the spirit of God

We are mothers of courage

Fathers of time

We are daughters of dust

And sons of great vision

We are sisters of mercy

Brothers of love

We’re lovers of life and the builders of nations

We’re seekers of truth and keepers of faith

Makers of peace and the wisdom of ages

We are our grandmother’s prayers

And we are our grandfather’s dreamings

We are the breath of our ancestors we are the spirit of God

For each child that born

A morning star rises and sings

To the universe who we are

For each child that born

A morning star rises and sings

To the universe who we are

For each child that born

A morning star rises and sings

To the universe who we are

For each child that born

A morning star rises and sings

To the universe who we are

We are one