All Graces Come Through Mary

[TrueLight]

We were discussing this in another thread and I want to take take a poll, because I am very concerned.

In fact, my heart is aching right now, because I fear I may have misunderstood Catholicism all along. I see Catholicism as a Christian religion based on Christ’s sacrifice where, his Blessed mother is honored above all the Saints and intercedes for us.

I do not see Catholicism as a Marian religion, through whom everything passes and eventually ends up with Christ.

I am very troubled.

Please be charitable.

 

[jmj1984]

We were discussing this in another thread and I want to take take a poll, because I am very concerned.

In fact, my heart is aching right now, because I fear I may have misunderstood Catholicism all along. I see Catholicism as a Christian religion based on Christ’s sacrifice where, his Blessed mother is honored above all the Saints and intercedes for us.

I do not see Catholicism as a Marian religion, through whom everything passes and eventually ends up with Christ.

I am very troubled.

Please be charitable.

You’ve nothing to fear, you haven’t misunderstood the catholic faith

The Catholic faith is based on Christ, if we honour Mary it is only because she is the perfect ‘guide’ so to speak that leads to Jesus Christ, our Lord and Saviour. What exactly is it that troubles you? Perhaps I may be able to resolve your fears?

 

[Te_Deum]

All graces come through Mary. She can grant or withhold graces by virtue of her being the Second Eve, Mother of Our Lord and Saviour and Queen of Heaven.

 

[hudson]

Through Mary we got Jesus. So through her we get all graces provided by our Lord. Jesus being the head, Mary is the neck, we are the body. That’s how I think about it.

 

[Cristiano]

All graces come through Mary. She can grant or withhold graces by virtue of her being the Second Eve, Mother of Our Lord and Saviour and Queen of Heaven.

I agree and disagree with you on this one. I agree when you say that all the graces come through Mary. However; I disagree that it is in virtue of her titles or better said on the way you present it. Her titles and her ability of granting graces come from the same source and that is why they are associated; however, one is not the cause of the others. I would simply explain that the capacity of granting or withholding is not based directly on her will but it is based on her perfect acceptance of God’s will, after all she is the Handmaid of the Lord. What I am saying it might appear simply as a lot of semantics (like what came first the chicken or the egg) but it can also help dissipating some confusion that people might have.

 

[followingtheway]

I voted “I’m not sure” because doesn’t it come from Jesus as is dispensed through Mary when she is invoked?

 

[justtryin]

All grace comes into the world through Mary because GRACE ITSELF came into the world through Mary. This does not make Mary the source of grace. God is the Source. Mary is only the vehicle. Many people raised in a Protestant atmosphere simply confuse VEHICLE for SOURCE. The misunderstanding is as simple as that.

From: Making Peace with the Mediatrix, By Mary Beth Kremski

Church documents and papal writings speak clearly. The Second Vatican Council states that “the Blessed Virgin is invoked in the Church under the titles of Advocate, Auxiliatrix, Adiutrix, and Mediatrix” (Lumen Gentium 62). ***Council refers to Pope St. Pius X, who said that Mary is the “dispensatrix of all the gifts and is the ‘neck’ connecting the head of the mystical body to the members. But all power The flows through the neck” ***(Ad Diem Illum 13).

Other popes and prominent saints have taught the same. In Octobri Mense Adventante, Pope Leo XIII wrote:
Nothing at all of that very great treasury of all grace that the Lord brought us—for “grace and truth came through Jesus Christ” [John 1:17]—nothing is imparted to us except through Mary, since God so wills.
In Inter Sodalicia, Pope Benedict XV told us:
Every kind of grace we receive from the treasury of the redemption is ministered as it were through the hands of the same sorrowful Virgin.
Pope Pius XI concurred in Ingravescentibus Malis:
We know that all things are imparted to us from God the greatest and best through the hands of the Mother of God.
This is only a sampling of consistent papal teaching: The Church does teach that Mary is the Mediatrix of all graces.

 

[_L]

how can we call Mary dispenstatrix of graces when grace is supernatural and cannot be “distributed” or “dispensed”? so how can this so called distribution take place on something which cannot be grasped or even seen?

 

[justtryin]

how can we call Mary dispenstatrix of graces when grace is supernatural and cannot be “distributed” or “dispensed”? so how can this so called distribution take place on something which cannot be grasped or even seen?

To receive grace, it must be given. To be given, it must be distributed.

So we answer, since Mary was associated with her Son in acquiring grace for us, she will also share with him in distributing that grace to us. This fits well with the words of the Popes, who call her the administra of grace, meaning that she administers or dispenses it. So Pope Leo XIII, Iucunda semper, said:

“… when He [the Father] has been invoked with excellent prayers, our humble voice turns to Mary; in accordance with no other law than that law of conciliation and petition which was expressed as follows by St. Bernardine of Siena : ’Every grace that is communicated to this world has a threefold course. For by excellent order, it is dispensed from God to Christ, from Christ to the Virgin, from the Virgin to us.’”

ewtn.com/faith/teachings/marya4.htm

 

[shadowlily]

We were discussing this in another thread and I want to take take a poll, because I am very concerned.

In fact, my heart is aching right now, because I fear I may have misunderstood Catholicism all along. I see Catholicism as a Christian religion based on Christ’s sacrifice where, his Blessed mother is honored above all the Saints and intercedes for us.

I do not see Catholicism as a Marian religion, through whom everything passes and eventually ends up with Christ.

I am very troubled.

Please be charitable.

You haven’t misunderstood Catholicism. You were exactly right.

Mary is honored above all the other Saints and intercedes for us, but she is human too. All grace comes from God. And though Mary can ask God to have mercy on us, she’s not going to do the opposite and ask him not to give grace, anyway.

 

[Bluegoat]

Hmm. So, what about the graces given to Adam and Eve before the Fall? Did they come through Mary?

Are there any examples of this being said or asserted in the Fathers?

 

[Whitacre_Girl]

You haven’t misunderstood Catholicism. You were exactly right.

Mary is honored above all the other Saints and intercedes for us, but she is human too. All grace comes from God. And though Mary can ask God to have mercy on us, she’s not going to do the opposite and ask him not to give grace, anyway.

I agree with this. God may choose to dispense grace through Mary, but she is not the source and certainly not the vehicle of all grace. God is the source of Grace, and it is his to distribute however he wishes.

 

[_L]

To receive grace, it must be given. To be given, it must be distributed.

This doesn’t answer the question, the issue isn’t “is grace dispensed?” The issue is “how is grace dispensed by a human being who isn’t God?” Grace has its origin in God, it cannot be seen, smelt, or touched, so what is Mary’s role in this distribution?

 

[Tantum_ergo]

All grace comes FROM God. Because God, our ultimate giver of grace, came into the world incarnate THROUGH Mary, all graces do come through her. . . because even though the birth of Christ took place in an instant of ‘recorded time’ it is, just as all events in Christ’s life, death, and resurrection are, eternal and unchanging, outside of time.

Just as God existed ‘before’ and will exist forever, Christ comes to us, through Mary, forever. This gives her status ‘above’ other mortals, but just like all other mortals, she ‘creates’ NO GRACE ON HER OWN, and just as other mortals have grace come through them if they choose to accept, she like other mortals has grace come through her, which she has accepted in her fiat, “Let it be done to me according to thy word.”

Just think, though. Know how great John the Baptist was? Greatest man born of woman, but 'the least in the kingdom are greater than he."

“The least” in the kingdom. . .implies there is a hierarchy in said kingdom. Well we know Christ said His apostles would take the place of the 12 tribes to sit in judgment, and we know that two people will sit in the places of honor at his right and his left, and we know that the last will be first and the first last. . .

So why is it such a shock to think that the woman who was found worthy enough to bear and raise and stand by the Son of God on earth would not have a position among her PEERS (that is to say, among humanity, since she is not a goddess) which reflects her higher status as Queen? We shouldn’t complain if we aren’t gonna be the Queen of heaven (if female) or the Great High King (if male). We should be glad enough if we get in as the least and lowest, though we should STRIVE to imitate Christ as much as we possibly can and do the best we possibly can.

 

[acarlson]

Mary can distribute graces, but only from God through her obedience to Him. Ergo, all graces come from God. It’s certain that not ALL graces come through (never truly “from,” since they aren’t HER graces that she’s giving) Mary. Her perfect obedience affords her great favor in God’s eyes, which allows her to dispense more graces than others. She delivers God’s graces, if you will.

Don’t worry!

 

[Luke_K]

Through Mary we got Jesus. So through her we get all graces provided by our Lord. Jesus being the head, Mary is the neck, we are the body. That’s how I think about it.

And through Mary’s parents we got Mary, and through her grandparents we got her parents, etc. all the way back to God creating everything. I don’t see how Mary giving birth to Jesus necessarily means all graces come through her, any more than Mary’s parents giving birth to Mary means all graces must also go through them before they get to us.

And what does it even mean to get grace through another person before it gets to us?

 

[GaryTaylor]

I answered this in post #133 of the other thread. However your 4-Poll questions take this answer out of context and leave 4-incorrect choice’s. It is church Doctrine, teaching and not by one but many Popes.

And the supernatural aspect of baptism would also need to be further explained probley to grasp where I’m coming from.

Peace

 

[Tsuwano]

All grace comes from God. It comes to us through whatever vehicle God chooses to deliver it. Our salvation, the greatest gift we have received from God, namely the Christ, came to us through Mary’s complete willingness to accept and fulfill the will of God in her life. In this way, Mary is very instrumental as a vehicle in which the grace of God has come into the world.

 

[TuAutem]

Mary is the PERFECT CHRISTIAN. When asking yourself any question about what her prayer can or cannot do, if the person of Mary obscures things for you, just replace it with that. “What can the prayer of a PERFECT CHRISTIAN obtain from God?”

Well, if said Christian really is perfectly Christian, then logically, her will is 100% attuned to God’s will. If that is so, then anything she asks of God will be, by definition, 100%, what God wants. Otherwise she would be imperfect in her love for Christ.

Therefore, anything she asks of God will be granted by God, and anything that she does not, will not be. Not because God answers to her, but because she answers to God. She could not, as a perfect Christian, ask of God anything he did not wish to grant–if she did, her will would not be in accordance with God’s.

This is not some idolatrous Mariolatry–it is simply the inescapable logical consequence of saying that Mary wants what God wants.

 

[_L]

Mary can distribute graces, but only from God through her obedience to Him. Ergo, all graces come from God. It’s certain that not ALL graces come through (never truly “from,” since they aren’t HER graces that she’s giving) Mary. Her perfect obedience affords her great favor in God’s eyes, which allows her to dispense more graces than others. She delivers God’s graces, if you will.

Don’t worry!

But still the question remains, HOW does she deliver them? Grace is not something to be delivered in a box or an envelope, it is spiritual aid from God. So how does Mary in her assumed body dispense that which is not physical? It just seems that suggesting that Mary distributes all of the graces de facto conjoins her into the trinity where her will is executed in terms of who gets grace and who does not.

Mary’s role as dispensatrix of grace makes since in the sense of the objective redemption where she literally gave birth or “delivered” the savior to us and thereby all the grace we get by virtue of Jesus Christ. But when we get into the realm of subjective redemption, that is, our prayer requests and graces received here and now, it gets a bit more confusing in regards to what Mary’s role in all of this is, I do not see how her role as dispensatrix makes sense in the context of the subjective redemption. Perhaps someone could shed some light on THIS aspect, seeing as the teaching of mediatrix is affirmed by many popes, but that means the entirety of the teaching is fragmented and does not have a unified explanation as of it since it has not been elevated to dogma (though it is still a Church doctrine)