I don't buy “Name It to Claim It”. Here’s why.
spoiler: It's personal. Heartbreak, Megachurches, and the American Dream.
Name it to claim it.
see also: Name it and claim it.
see also: Name and Claim
see also: Name it, claim it
I see it everywhere. It’s come up in collaborative brainstorms. In workshops from business leaders I admire. In new years goal setting instagram posts. In email newsletters reflecting on new seasons.
In some ways, the literal words make sense.
Name: to state aloud.
Claim: to take ownership of something that was already yours (ex: baggage claim).
In the literal definition of these words, I see a phrase I don’t object to very much. Articulating an intention in language puts it in the front of our minds. It provokes focus and energy in a specific direction. When we say something out loud, people are more likely to respond and support that effort. Language alters our perception, our ability to discern differences between opportunities and categories. Language is awesome. Naming is powerful.
And recognizing what belongs to us? That’s a reclamation of identity and dignity that can be really beautiful.
And it rhymes! Who doesn’t love a good rhyme?! A great strong vowel in “-ai-”! Strong consonants in “n” and “cl”! It’s fun to say! It feels good in the mouth! It’s pithy! It’s catchy! It’s memorable!
But that is not what this phrase means.
How words are used in culture matters. The backdrop to how a phrase has evolved and moved through social mindset impacts what we do in response to that language.
“Name it to claim it” has a long, pernicious history.
The Word of Faith movement has theological roots going back to a few preachers in the late 1800s but came into visibility in the 1960s. It is part of a larger stream called “the prosperity gospel” which promised financial stability. It’s the idea that God wants you to be wealthy and healthy and all good things. And when you put your faith in Him and invest in His causes, that energy will come back to you in the literal form of thriving across all vectors—but especially financial areas because it’s easy to measure.
Name God’s promises and Claim them as your own.
The sneak attack: you are asked to demonstrate the extent of your faith with an investment. Part of “naming” and “claiming” is putting your money on the line.
The result: pastors with private jets. Churches with mega-complexes. Financial scams and pyramid schemes.
And believers who still struggle to make ends meet? They are told implicitly and explicitly that the ongoing struggle is from lack of faith.
This idea is very aligned with the criminalization of poverty. To be poor signals that you and God aren’t on good terms. This episode of Throughline goes into it with some depth (though the tie to Calvinism seems a bit of a stretch to me), tracing the idea all the way to former President Trump who has named several prosperity gospel teachers as influential in his self-formation.
I learned about the prosperity gospel in an abstract way as a kid. I was raised in the evangelical movement, attending a “small” megachurch in central Pennsylvania from the age of 9 till I left for college. With a church with thousands of attendees, there is bound to be some diversity of thought but, on the whole, the culture was rooted in a word-by-word explication of the Bible with the pragmatic goal of direct application to our personal lives.
I learned about prosperity gospel as “this is not real” and “this is not how God works.” It even had a name: “Santa-ism”, the idea you could just ask God for stuff like a kid asks Santa for presents.
Prosperity gospel wasn’t my particular ill. But it was still part of the stream of ideas I existed in.
Prosperity gospel is one of the central exports of Western Christianity. When I lived in Bulgaria, the idea was everywhere. On one particular morning when I was in the capital city for a break, I went to a Hillsong church plant, a denomination not even part of the prosperity gospel movement but riddled with its own scandals in recent years. The Australian pastor had people write down what they were calling on God to deliver by faith. He declared God’s power over cancer, over financial struggle, over faltering marriages. And then he took the collection. It was clear: the act of faith of investing money in this church was part of having faith in God.
I felt sick. I hid in the bathroom and cried. These people were being lied to in their desperation.
My parents were divorcing at the time. It seemed that their stated commitment to God hadn’t saved their relationship so what was God for? My heartbreak was tied up in heartbreak about what following God was supposed to mean in my life. I didn’t believe in the “prosperity gospel” but I still suffered as one will always do in trying to make sense of a loving God and a not-loving world.
To summarize: this is personal to me.
To overpromise a result is one of the more horrible crimes I can imagine committing as a language strategist. It is more than just a let down. It can actively crack through a person’s will to live, to keep going. It can take everything and give nothing back.
“Name it to claim it” is a soul-breaking phrase when embraced in its full meaning and context. And it’s something I have had in my mind continuously as I’ve leaned into “naming” as the term for what I do for work and in my business.
To overpromise a result is one of the more horrible crimes I can imagine committing as a language strategist. It is more than just a let down. It can actively crack through a person’s will to live, to keep going. It can take everything and give nothing back.
So did “name it to claim it” sneak into a bunch of public spaces and used by very intelligent people who, if asked, would insist that systemic oppression is the root of our problems, not individual faith?
I don’t fully know. It feels bit like trying to trace a viral jump from animals to humans without having any training in infectious disease. When I google the phrase, it’s all Christian references and websites, some supporting the idea, some deconstructing it.
But I am seeing it in other public spaces.
It does make sense to me though. It’s close kin to its sibling of ideals, the American Dream, that promise of inevitable upward mobility and possibility, the “manifest destiny” of God’s blessing on America to thrive and overcome. “Name it to claim it” is a plant from somewhere else that’s doing just too well in the already rich soil of American ideals.
I really do presume innocence when I see people in the business world using “Name it to claim it”. I don’t think these people know that it’s a phrase from a Christian source. I don’t think they know it’s associated with this branch of church function associated with exploitative wealth. I don’t think they know it’s influence on people like Trump.
The phrase itself is so shiny. So interesting. So similar to goal setting and habit formation systems. It seems so akin to vision boarding and manifestation. It feels aligned with mission and vision statements, with why statements, with Put-It-Into-Words-as-a-Powerful-Act statements (hi it’s me). It feels kin to the general obsession with “designing lives” and intentionality as an ethic and value.
Linguistic context matters. We must stop using “Name it to claim it” as coaches, educators, and thought leaders. We must question its use across the communities we spend our time and money in.
To live with intention, to “name” what one is after, is not showing up at the bank teller with a slip that confirms the transfer of assets to your bank account. And implying as such, even accidentally, to our people is profound misconduct.
Further Reading:
this wikipedia article on the full history of the prosperity gospel is gold. Lots of quality citations.
Blessed: A History of the Prosperity Gospel by Kate Bowler. And Kate Bowler is so legit.
This piece questioning the relationship of prosperity gospel and the housing crash in 2008 by Hanna Rosin
This Throughline Episode
PS.
Bit of a thinky letter this week! Thanks for sticking it out to the end!
You are so good at articulating these convoluted, messy, secretive truths.
Holy cow this is gold.