Meditations for Layfolk - The Sign of The Cross

This emblem of the Christian Faith has long been in use in the Church. Already on the rough walls of the catacombs we find it traced among the earliest representations of religion. Mention is made of the Cross so often, too, in the epistles of Saint Paul, that it seems evident that even then it had become an actual sign of the faith. It stood, that is to say, not only as the emblem or memorial of the Passion of the Saviour, but was looked upon rather as summing up in itself the whole religion of Christ: it was symbolic of all Christian faith, In Saint Peter's writings, too, it has a deep mystic meaning. Then we also find that in the same fashion as we use it, the early Christians traced the form of the Cross upon themselves as a constant reminder of the love and gratitude that they owed to their Master, and in order to ask a blessing upon all their actions during day and night. From a passage in the writings of Tertullian which is too well known to need quotation, we can be certain that as they went about their business, these early followers of Christ used it openly and frequently as a sign of fellowship and as something that summed up in itself the whole of the Creed. Again, according to the story which has become a tradition of the Christian people, it was the Cross that Constantine saw in vision on the eve of his great battle against Maxentius. Through it was victory promised to him; but what is of greater interest is to see that in this legend it is assumed that the Cross already stood for the whole Faith of Christ.

Thus, too, we note that it has entered into the liturgy of the Church. Her rites begin and end with it. Her ceremonial is spangled with its brightness. The Church seems unable to place herself in the sanctuary, or move from one office to another, or put her benediction upon things of common use, without an appeal to that saving sign. As her children put themselves to sleep or rise to their labours in the morning, as they begin the day or end it, as they pray or eat, it is under the invocation of that sign. At the font they are welcomed by it, and when it is the time for them to go from this world to the next, it is formed in blest oil upon those several senses through which the soul has gone out to its fall, that by its potency the vestiges of sin may be removed. Even in death, before all their muscles have grown stiff, their arms are crossed upon their breasts in memory of it: they can no longer form it otherwise than dumbly, unconsciously; and all through life it continues to be part of the blessed things that the Church can offer. The absolving words are spoken by the priest in confession while he forms upon the empty air that symbol through which all efficacy came to the sacrament in the beginning. At Communion the same form is traced by the Host before it descends into our breast. At Confirmation it becomes itself the symbol, both of the persecution life has in store and the strength through which these persecutions are to be outfaced. The touching rite of Marriage, by which the union of human hearts in love is made consecrate to God, has the peace foreshown by mutual sacrifice in the unending symbol of that supreme love of Calvary.

The actual words used while we trace the sign show us, indeed, what all the various rites and customs imply - namely, that the Cross is the shortest profession of the Christian Faith, and does sum up in itself all the chief mysteries that are incumbent upon the belief of every follower of Christ. We say, in truth, that we acknowledge the Trinity - the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. To this we add in memory of the event of which it is a sign our acceptance of all that is included in the tragedy of the Crucifixion - namely, the divinity and humanity and redeeming power of our Master. From these truths spring the radiating glory of all the other mysteries of our Faith. Now we have therefore to be constantly asking ourselves whether we do really make use of this sign in the way we ought, whether we do really attend to the full meaning of it. Are we conscious of the words and the form when we so hurriedly begin our prayers or scurry through our grace before and after meals? Should we not be much more reverent and exact in our use of the Cross? At meals, how often does it not become a mere hasty wave of the fingers which is in no danger of compromising us in the profession of our faith. There is, indeed, no reason why we should parade our beliefs, but neither is there any reason why we should be ashamed of them. Let the Cross supply, then, the material of my devotions, when I have made my meditations on it, with its memories of the Trinity, the In carnation, the whole cycle of the Sacraments, and the prefiguring of my own death. Surely as truly as to Constantine the vision has been vouchsafed me, that it is in the sign of the Cross that I shall conquer, if I am to conquer at all. Let me always use it as a real prayer.

- text taken from Meditations for Layfolk by Father Bede Jarrett, O.P.