Sign of the cross
From The Art and Popular Culture Encyclopedia
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The Sign of the Cross (Template:Lang-la), or crossing oneself, is a ritual hand motion made by members of many branches of Christianity, often accompanied by spoken or mental recitation of a trinitarian formula.
The motion is the tracing of the shape of a cross in the air or on one's own body, echoing the traditional shape of the cross of the Christian Crucifixion narrative. There are two principal forms: the older—three fingers, right to left—is exclusively used in the Eastern Orthodox churches and the Eastern Rites of the Catholic Church; the other—left to right, other than three fingers—is the one used in the Latin-Rite Catholic Church, Anglicanism, Lutheranism and Oriental Orthodoxy (see below). The ritual is rare within other Christian traditions. It is said that the most ancient form of making the sign of the cross was by tracing a cross on the forehead, followed by the lips and then over the heart. This is still observed in the Roman Catholic Church and in Anglicanism when the Gospel is being declared.
In culture
Sign of the Cross may refer to:
- Sign of the Cross, the ritual hand motion by Christians
- The Sign of the Cross (book): Travels in Catholic Europe, a book by Colm Tóibín
- The Sign of the Cross (play), 1895 play by Wilson Barrett
- The Sign of the Cross (film), directed by Cecil B. DeMille, based on the play
See also
- Christian cross
- Christian symbolism
- Genuflection
- Prayer in Christianity
- Trinitarian formula
- Veneration
- Pranāma
