Advent & Christmas Reflections

Marana tha!

The phrase "marana tha" appears at the end of St. Paul's first letter to the Corinthians:
 
In the original Aramaic it means "O Lord, come!" and was most likely an expression or acclamation used in the early Christian liturgy. During the season of Advent the coming of our Lord is set before us in an immediate way in the scriptures proclaimed during Mass - both in anticipation of his birth and looking ahead to his return at the end of time.

Interestingly, if the phrase is reparsed as "maran atha" it shifts to the past tense: "Our Lord has come." During the celebration of the Christmas season we rejoice that God has come in the form of a helpless infant, taking on our human nature and transforming it so that "not only does human mortality receive unending honor but by wondrous union we, too, are made eternal." ( Preface III of the Nativity of the Lord)

It is our hope that these reflections will assist you in keeping both the Advent and Christmas celebrations so that the prayer of the early Church may be ours as well: Marana tha!