I wish Catholics would make up their minds. Did Mary need a savior or didn’t she? (Hint: She called God “my savior.”)
Yes! She was saved at her conception!
The Catholic Church has never suggested that she didn’t need a savior.
Really, among Jesuits is Mary’s humanity in dispute or that the Baby Jesus is God incarnate? Am always genuinely and respectfully curious about Catholic doctrine. I’m in a choir that’s singing this hymn in a couple weeks and it is one of the most moving we have in the Christmas repertoire. I find it hard to understand why a priest would object to the message it conveys.
And she wasn’t without fault; Jesus had to correct her / rebuke her at the wedding when he turned water into wine.
She was far better than average, but not perfect.
Total Goddess worship, it’s bizarre.
To postulate that Mary was born sinless is to say God DIDN’T need Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross, His death and propitiation, for...if God was able to save Mary without the crucifixion, He could have saved EVERYBODY without the crucifixion!
And, to say Jesus couldn’t have been born in a sinful vessel, well, did that mean Elizabeth, Mary’s mother, was ALSO born sinless? If Mary needed to be born sinless to hold Jesus, then Elizabeth ALSO needed to be born sinless to be a vessel for Mary’s birth!
And Elizabeth’s mother, didn’t SHE also, need to be born sinless??
Total absurdity...
Ed
You've made a valid point there, fwdude.
Jesus was and is Mary's Savior, as she said. Yet ever before she conceived Him in her womb, she was "full of grace" (as God's angelic ambassador called her, Kecharitomene) --- "she who has already been fully graced". Gabriel described her as full of grace, not full of sin.
What can we reasonably conclude from this apparent paradox? It's that God's co-eternal Son, the Second Person of the Trinity, had a way to save Mary before Her took His flesh from her, and before she even came into existence.
"He who is holy has done great things for me!"
It would have to have been when she received her human nature, as every one of us does, at conception. Because her human nature --- which she shared with her Son --- was a pure and perfect human nature, like that of primordial Adam and primordial Eve in Eden, not yet ruined by sin. Jesus is perfect in His Hiumanity as well as in His divibity.
Rgus Mary had to be uniquely pure in her human nature: as the Angel Gabriel said, "Kecharitomene."
Perhaps a visit to Lourdes France would help you understand the words of the Blessed Mother.
The Lady says her name: “Que soy era Immaculada Counceptiou”
Le 25 mars 1858, jour de la seizième apparition, Bernadette se rend à la Grotte où, à l’initiative de l’abbé Peyramale, curé de Lourdes, elle demande à “la Dame” de dire son nom. Par trois fois, Bernadette pose la question. A la quatrième demande, “la Dame” lui répond en patois : “Que soy era Immaculada Counceptiou”, ce qui veut dire en français “Je suis l’Immaculée Conception”. Bernadette n’a pas compris immédiatement le sens de cette parole. L’Immaculée Conception, tel que l’enseigne l’Église, c’est “Marie conçue sans péché, grâce aux mérites de la Croix du Christ” (définition du dogme promulgué en 1854). Bernadette se rend aussitôt chez Monsieur le Curé pour lui transmettre le nom de “la Dame”. Il comprend que c’est la Mère de Dieu qui apparaît à la Grotte. Plus tard, l’évêque de Tarbes, Mgr Laurence, authentifiera cette révélation.
http://en.lourdes-france.org/deepen/message-lourdes
On March 25, 1858, day of the Sixteenth apparition, Bernadette goes to the Grotto where, at the initiative of Abbot Peyramale, priest of Lourdes, she asks “the Lady” to tell his name. Three times Bernadette asked the question. At the fourth request, “the Lady” responds in dialect “Que soy era Immaculada Counceptiou” which means in French “I am the Immaculate Conception”. Bernadette does not understand immediately the meaning of this word. The Immaculate Conception, as taught by the Church, is “Mary conceived without sin, through the merits of the Cross of Christ” (definition of the dogma promulgated in 1854). Bernadette goes immediately to the priest to pass it the name of “the Lady”. He understands that it is the Mother of God that appears at the Grotto. Later, Tarbes Bishop Laurence, authenticate this revelation.