Did Mary need a Savior?

[mom2three]

I know this might be a stupid question… but I don’t really understand…

We know that Mary was without sin.

Why, then, did she need a Savior?

 

[E.E.N.S]

I know this might be a stupid question… but I don’t really understand…

We know that Mary was without sin.

Why, then, did she need a Savior?

She was saved from sinning. (Much like if you saved someone from falling into a pit vs. saving a person who fell into a pit - both were saved, just in different ways, and if anything the former owes a greater amount of gratitude for being saved in a more perfect way.)

 

[LindaS]

God was able to apply to Mary the benefits of Jesus’ death on the Cross before the fact. That is, she received salvation from Jesus’ death just as we do, only before His actual death. God is outside of time, is not bound by time as we are, so He can apply the benefits of something that hasn’t yet happened. Example: A person is walking down the road and falls into a hole. Someone comes along and pulls the person out of the hole. The second person has saved the first from the hole. A person is walking down the road and is about to fall into a hole. Someone grabs him and keeps him from falling into the hole. The second person has saved the first from the hole. We fall into the hole; Mary was kept from falling into the hole.
Hope this makes sense, and helps!

Peace,
Linda

 

[LindaS]

E.E.N.S.

You posted as I was typing!

Peace,
Linda

 

[Della]

Mary indeed needed a Savior, as she herself says in the Magnificat: “My soul rejoices in God my Savior.”

Because she was to be the Mother of Christ, God preserved her from all stain of original sin through the death Jesus was to suffer on our behalf. So, God merely saved her before she could sin instead of after the fact as he does with the rest of us.

This special privilege was granted to her so that no claim could be made by Satan to the person of Christ, and because it was fitting that Jesus’ Mother should be the first to be saved from the corruption of sin.

If we think about the fact that the holy people of the OT were looking forward to the redemption of the Messiah, and were granted it when Jesus died on the cross, it is not hard to understand that Mary, being born before Jesus’ redemptive death, could have been saved in anticipation of that redemptive death. For God not only can do whatever he pleases, but he is not limited by time and space.

 

[Todd_Easton]

As the other posters have said, Mary may have been referring to God as her Savior because, by His grace, He saved her from contracting Original Sin and from committing personal sin throughout her life but, it seems to me that, she was more probably referring to the much-anticipated material salvation of Israel, God’s deliverance of Israel from its enemies under the Messiah, now present in her womb.

 

[Verbum]

Hi mom2,

Pius IX defined this doctrine in Ineffabilis Deus. Here is the core of the definition :

We declare, pronounce, and define that the doctrine which holds that the most Blessed Virgin Mary, in the first instance of her conception, by a singular grace and privilege granted by Almighty God, in view of the merits of Jesus Christ, the Savior of the human race, was preserved free from all stain of original sin, is a doctrine revealed by God and therefore to be believed firmly and constantly by all the faithful

Complete text at
newadvent.org/library/docs_pi09id.htm

So if is of faith not only that Mary was free from original sin but that this privilege is due to the merits of Jesus Christ Savior.

Verbum