The sign of the cross
Holy Cross Day, 14th September, 2008
Fr Matthew Healy
Assistant Priest, St Peter's, Eastern Hill
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Signs and gestures are an everyday experience for all people, in all cultures, and from all religious creeds. We use signs as a form of language. Signs can replace words. A sign communicates — it delivers a message, it has meaning. A sign points to the thing signified.
We know what the other is expressing to us by the sign that they give to us — these signs vary according to their intention and purpose. To express friendliness: a smile directed at someone, a wave with our hand, to give a handshake, or give a kiss on the cheek. To express direction: a hand used to indicate movement to the left or right, the right hand digit finger placed across the lips to indicate silence. Also driving a car often invokes in many people an array of signs, just ask anyone who has been a passenger in a car driven by me. Signs therefore have evocative powers which assist people to understand a particular message. Signs also allow a more powerful expression of interior feelings and attitudes.
We Christians are no different from any other people by our use of signs to convey a message, emphasise a meaning and to express a particular attitude. The liturgy of the Christian church is rich in sign and symbol which sometimes and sometimes not, accompany words used in speech and song. The Sacred Scriptures provide a myriad of examples wherein through sign and symbol the message of God is made known or whereby God's people express their faith in God.
The most powerful sign that distinguishes Christianity from any other religious creed, or from any philosophy, or society of people, is the cross. Not even Sydney Diocese can escape the truth of what makes the sign of the cross so powerful.
It is interesting to note as to just how recent it was that protestant antagonism toward the 'sign of the cross' was a badge of the war cry of 'No Popery.' Our church of St Peter received an attack in 1846 whilst it was under construction. The weighty stone cross attached to the gable of the church was stolen and found lynched by a rope in a gulley in the nearby Fitzroy Gardens. I would just so much enjoy observing the various expressions of horror and disbelief on the face of the people who took down that cross in 1846, if they were transported in time to St Peter's in 2008 and attended 11.00am Divine Service. Indeed, not a stitch of Popery to be seen anywhere, not even on the laced cottas!
The symbol of the Cross is common to Christians of all traditions and it has been our sign our faith for a long time. It continues to be expressed in art, in and on our churches, and as ornaments on our bodies. All of this is appropriate for Christians, because the sign of the Cross constantly reminds us of what Christ achieved for all people. St. Paul writes in his letter to the Galatians "Far be it from me to glory except in the Cross of Our Lord Jesus Christ"(6:14). For St. Paul the Cross is one of the two hinges of our faith, the other is the Resurrection. In fact, the Resurrection is only possible after we have been crucified "to the world" and the world to us. This idea is at the heart of Christian belief; that Resurrection is our goal, but the Cross is the means. The road to God and eternal life is through the Cross of Jesus.
The actual physical making of the 'Sign of the Cross' is an ancient sign practiced by the early Christians. From as early as Tertullian, who died in 230 AD, Christian writers testify to the use of the 'sign of the Lord', as it was called, as a means of expressing Christian sanctification of every action in daily life: from rising in the morning to retiring at night; as an encouragement in temptation and trial; as a means of mutual recognition in times of persecution. Tertullian writes
In all our actions, when we come in or go out, when we dress, when we wash, at our meals, before resting to sleep, we make on our forehead the sign of the cross. These practices are not committed by a formal law of scripture, but tradition teaches them, custom confirms them, and faith observes them.
St. Augustine (A.D. 431) likewise speaks of the use of the 'Sign of the Cross' many times in his sermons and letters. Extant documents of the early church liturgies also testify that the 'Sign of the Cross' was also employed in the rites of Christian initiation of Baptism and Chrismation from an early date.
It is also interesting to note, that despite much protestant objection to the use of 'signs,' the spark of the continental reformation, Martin Luther, instructed his followers to make the sign of the cross at beginning and at the end of the day as part of daily prayers. In both the small and large Catechism he says "When you get out of bed....before you go to bed, bless yourself with the holy cross." Our own Book of Common Prayer retains the use of the 'Sign of the Cross' in baptism and goes to some length to defend its retention and practice in the Reformed Church of England. Richard Hooker, the 16th century Theologian of Anglicanism par excellence, devotes an entire chapter to the subject in his tome wherein he defends and justifies the use of the 'Sign of the Cross.'[1]
It is fitting that when we come together in worship, we should worship with all our being — to worship our Creator with our minds, our souls, and also our bodies, for our bodies are the "Temple of the Holy Spirit." Making the sign of the Cross is nothing less than worshiping with our bodies, for what is more fitting for the body than movement and gesture? When we use words to pray, we are using only one form of language. The body has its own language also, in which making the sign of the Cross is an eloquent expression. One small gesture can speak volumes. The 'Sign of the Cross" as a bodily, physical act, expresses three things: worship, prayer, and doctrine. The making the of 'Sign of the Cross' is worship, for it draws us out of our pre-occupation and points us to the Triune God; it is prayer, even when used without words, for it reminds us that Christ's death and resurrection is indeed our present life and our future hope; it is doctrinal, for reminds us that we profess belief in a God who is three persons in one Godhead, the Holy Trinity, and it reminds us that Christ died on the Cross for our salvation, so that by his death and resurrection we are forgiven, healed and restored into our true being, made, not marred, in the image of God.
The 'Sign of the Cross' is the symbol of our salvation. We were signed with it when we were baptized. It is the sign by which the church blesses people and things. By it we become part of the wonderful history of our faith and companions in the company of the saints. It is right that we should make the sign of the cross frequently and to glory in it.
Let us today, as we commemorate the Feast of the Holy Cross, embrace the cross of Jesus as the expression of our willingness to take up the cross of discipleship, bursting with joyful hope in the promise of the Resurrection. Let every act of the 'Sign of the Cross' we make be an act of ongoing consecration whereby we physically remind ourselves that our whole person, body and spirit, mind and heart, belong to the Triune God. Let us not recoil from the 'Sign of the Cross' in fear of embarrassment, or out of any shyness in the faith we profess with our everyday lives - at prayer, at table, in time of temptation, and in time of joy — so that with St Paul in his appeal to the church in Corinth we may "proclaim Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those who are called, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.....know nothing [therefore] but Jesus Christ, and him crucified." May 'Sign of the Cross' continue to be for us the outward vesture of a lively faith in him who suffered, died and rose, and who gives us his Spirit for our very life and our salvation.
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Note:
[1] Richard Hooker, "Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity", Book V, Chapter xlv.
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