Did St. Mary need a redeemer?

Question

Now let's look at the issue of Mary's sinless nature. Consider that when the angel addresses Mary at the annunciation, the greeting is almost a name change:

"Hail, thou that art highly favored, the Lord is with thee: blessed art thou among women" (Luke 1:28, KJV).

Mary (Miriam in Hebrew) means "beloved." In biblical times a person's name reflected what they were. Name changes have great theological significance in the Bible and this is almost as if her name is being changed from "beloved" to "thou that art highly favored." Since this is before Jesus has.........http://blog.360.yahoo.com/blog-S6YMuFYyaa9ESBoW5DFwEjL_HhqA?p=102

apple182,

How can someone be sinful and be full of grace at the same time? She was sinless because the Savior of the world could not be born with original sin. She, therefore, could not be a sinful vessel. You say she was chosen for her faithfulness. Are you trying to say that she was the only woman who had faith? If not, how many women refuse the angel before St. Mary said yes to the angel Gabriel? Jesus was certainly perfect because of His Godliness but St. Mary was without sin because she was preserved that way by the Savior. There was another who was without original sin and that was St. John the Baptist.

(Luk 1:15 DRB) For he shall be great before the Lord and shall drink no wine nor strong drink: and he shall be filled with the Holy Ghost, even from his mother's womb.

SilentKnight,

Yes it is important that Jesus be a spotless lamb just as the prophets foretold and that is a basis for the Catholic faith. If Jesus was not the spotless lamb as you contend all of the Gospel would fall and Jesus cannot be the Messiah. Is that your position?

Answer 1

Yes, she did. The difference is that God applied the merits of Christ to her BEFORE her birth, instead of after. Hence, the Immaculate Conception.

When discussing the Immaculate Conception, an implicit reference may be found in the angel’s greeting to Mary. The angel Gabriel said, "Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with you" (Luke 1:28). The phrase "full of grace" is a translation of the Greek word kecharitomene. It therefore expresses a characteristic quality of Mary.

The traditional translation, "full of grace," is better than the one found in many recent versions of the New Testament, which give something along the lines of "highly favored daughter." Mary was indeed a highly favored daughter of God, but the Greek implies more than that (and it never mentions the word for "daughter"). The grace given to Mary is at once permanent and of a unique kind. Kecharitomene is a perfect passive participle of charitoo, meaning "to fill or endow with grace." Since this term is in the perfect tense, it indicates that Mary was graced in the past but with continuing effects in the present. So, the grace Mary enjoyed was not a result of the angel’s visit. In fact, Catholics hold, it extended over the whole of her life, from conception onward. She was in a state of sanctifying grace from the first moment of her existence.

Answer 2

While I'm not Catholic, I can tell you there were four immaculate conceptions: 1) Yeshua (Jesus) Immanuel the Christ 2) Maria (Mary) - Mother of Christ (parents: Hannah & Yioakhim, "St. Anne" is the Greek rendering of "Hannah"). The Archangel Gabriel revealed to the High Priest Shamaon that Hannah would conceive (Mary) by immaculate conception. 3) Yiohannan (John) the Evangelist; author of Revelation (parents: Myriam Shalome & Shabbatai) 4) Yiohannan (John) the Baptist (parents: Zakharias & Elizabeth) Incidentally, all human beings are Holy and Logoic; recall "Ye are Gods, and Children of the Most High" (Psalm 82:6). I should emphasize two more things: (a) Mary and John the Evangelist were Archangels of the Archangelic Order of Principalities, and (b) the birth of Elizabeth and Myriam Shalome (daughters of Hannah, as well) were neither virgin, nor immaculate conceptions (only Mary). P.S. Some say Mary's mother - Hannah - was a Druid, but there's no evidence to support such a theory. Druids were believed to be the Levitical priesthood of the ten "lost" tribes of Israel, in exile .

Answer 3

But haven't you gone through some of the other esoteric texts/ resources that say Mary was one of the Archangels - a purified vessel, in itself without sin, incarnated into the world to beget the Most Holy One.
And what about the symbolic equation of the Ark of the Covenant with Mary?
Surely there is more to it than meets the eye?

Answer 4

She was at the Cross~and Jesus turned her over to the Apostle John and she was in the upper room where the Holy Spirit of God was poured out

Answer 5

Yes
but the merits of Christ her redeemer were applied beforehand for the sake of the total purity of the human nature God the Word took.

All creatures are dependent for sanctification upon the creator

Answer 6

God saved her by preserving her from sin, she is saved by Jesus's act on the cross just as we are. How is this so? Lets use this illustration: you may pull a man out of a hole he has fallen into, or you may preserve him from falling into the hole in the first place. The former is us, the latter is Mary. Jesus applied his redemptive act on the cross to Mary before she was conceived. How? his redemptive act (dying on the cross) is universally applied to those whom died before and after the act. It was an act that existed outside of time because Christ was God. That is how those holy people whom died before Christ came were able to obtain heaven.

Answer 7

Between your post Cristoig and Crusaders answer I think you both have said it all and with great logic too,sadly your wisdom will fall on deaf and biased ears.

Answer 8

It is Sunday, family day! A glorious day to have a picnic so you decided to have one in the park. The picnic place has a body of water near it, let's say a river, a shallow one. Though it is shallow, your child can still drown. Because the view is better near the river, you decided to encamp near it. Playful as your child is, you let them just play and run because you gave them free will to do it. But suddenly, you noticed that your child is approaching the river. You shouted, "Honey, don't go to the river!" But with your child's curiosity, the child jumped to the river and is beginning to drown. You saw your child and you ran. You jumped to the river and was able to save your child. You even cried when you saved your child and said, "It is ok, I am with you now!"

That is one way to save your child. But there is another one, a better way. When you saw your child approaching the river, you ran to your child, carried your child and went back to your picnic blanket.

That was how God saved our Blessed Virgin Mary. Before her soul would even dip in the river of sin, God ran to her, carried her, saved her! That is how blessed Mary is. She did not do it by herself because she cannot. We can see that Mary is dependent to God for her salvation.

All of us were saved in the first manner that the child was saved. We were all drowning at the river of sin because our first parents, Adam and Eve fell to it themselves. God was shouting at us through the prophets and now through the Church saying, "Honey, don't go to the river!" But still, we satisfied our curiosity and fell to the river of sin.

Now, He saw that we are all drowning. He then saw Mary approaching the river but God did not let Mary even touch her toes at the river of sin because He has a plan for her, which is to bring into existence the One who will save us all from drowning at the river of sin.

My dear Christian friends, If God saved her from having even a single sin, how much more He could save her from being touched by any man.

Ad Majorem Dei Gloriam

Answer 9

Did you miss the part about how after the birth of Christ Mary went to the synagogue to make a sin offering? Or did you miss how Jesus never referrred to her as mother? Or when at the wedding (the first recorded miracle) she asked Jesus to do something about the fact that they were running out of wine, Jesus had to correct her (not disrespect her)? The bible said that she was favored among women, not a sinless woman.

Of course Catholics would hold that Mary was sinless, as that is the basis (and center) of the Catholic faith. Without that as an anchor all else about Catholisim could not stand.
(<-----Former Catholic)

"For ALL have sinned and fall short of the glory of God"

Answer 10

Jake -- beautiful answer. Thank you.