“What about Mary?”
+John Chrysostomos said she did indeed commit sin. Panagia was born as human as you and me. Her nature was as fallen as all mankind’s. In other words, she had the same propensity to sin as the rest of us. If she were different from us in that regard, her Son, Christ, would not be True God and True Man. She, however, attained a state of perfect theosis by her cooperation with and total submission to the grace of God. Because we and she are not God, while we Orthodox believe that she committed no voluntary sins in her life, she may very well have committed involuntary ones for which we Orthodox Christians also ask for forgiveness. Thus we have the line, “...for there is no one who lives and is sinless. You alone are without sin.”
Kolo: +John Chrysostomos said she did indeed commit sin. Panagia was born as human as you and me. Her nature was as fallen as all mankind’s.
FK, the Eastern Church does not believe in Mary's immaculate conception, so her nature is equally fallen, as the rest of Adam's descendants, even if she dis not commit any personal sins. She still had the "maucla" (spot) of Adam's sin. Christ doesn't.
But Roman Catholics believe otherwise, and for that reason you won't hear a Roman Catholic priest chant with regard to Jesus "for there is no one who lives and is sinless. You alone are without sin" precisely because someone would ask "What about Mary?"
The Roman Catholic dogma of Immaculate Conception implies that, besides Jesus, Mary was born ontologcially like the pre-Fall Eve, and supposedly remained in that state during her earthly life. The East believes that she was cleansed of all sin (basically baptized by the Spirit) at the Annunciation, and made an 'acceptable vessel," and that, being under special grace, she sinned not since.
I do seem to remember that the Immaculate Conception is a point of disagreement between Latins and the East (with the East being correct :). Nevertheless, I thought it was Orthodox that Mary in fact actually committed no sin. If that it true for voluntary sins, then what would constitute an involuntary sin, and if it was involuntary why would it be proper to ask for forgiveness? In the OT it was normal and ordinary for people to be "involuntarily" unclean or unclean for a reason not considered sin in and of itself (e.g. monthly period). Is this the same thing?