Sign your (episcopal or presbyteral) name...

The practice of affixing crosses to the names of bishops and priests in Anglicanism is a relatively modern practice; however, for bishops specifically it has a much more ancient and venerable precedent. The practice of signing the episcopal name with the cross at the front of the name was certainly a common practice in the Western Church by the High Middle Ages, a symbol of the sacramental nature of the episcopate and of apostolic jurisdiction, and was taken over by Anglican Bishops in some places at the Reformation. The practice was almost certainly universal within the Anglican Communion by the nineteenth century, as it was in both the Roman and Eastern Churches by the same time. It is Catholic custom. Today, the cross at the beginning of an episcopal signature has come to signify the episcopal dignity and the status of the episcopate in all Catholic Churches, Eastern and Western. The practice of priests signing their names with a cross at the end is peculiarly Anglican and is, to my knowledge, found nowhere else in Catholic Christendom. The practice probably arises from the Oxford Movement of the nineteenth century, when Anglicans reasserted the sacramental and sacerdotal character of the Anglican presbyterate. I do not believe priests of the Roman and Eastern Communions have ever signed their names with the cross. Another wonderful Anglican eccentricity!