28 And the angel being come in, said unto her:
Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with thee:
blessed art thou among women.
29 Who having heard, was troubled at his
saying, and thought with herself what manner
of salutation this should be.
30 And the angel said to her: Fear not, Mary,
for thou hast
found grace with God.
Luke 1:28-30 (DR-V)
That term “full of grace” does not fully explain what really
happened to Mary. The Greek word or “name” that was given to Mary by God was
Kecharitomene.
The full greeting that the Angel used was “
Chaire, Kecharitomene” which really means
“Hail, (one who has been made) Full of Grace!”
That word, which God chose as Mary’s name, means that Mary
has been perfected in Grace and is also
presently in Grace. This is a
past action that occured. She
has been made Full of Grace. Full to the point of overflowing.
So to answer your question; “in the past”
she was perfected in Grace. In the present, she
IS Full of Grace and she
continues to be FULL of Grace.
Here are some websites that might contain an explanation
of that phrase the Angel uses for Mary;
Mary’s Immaculate Conception
Kecharitomene Questions ← click then scroll down to that section.
The Immaculate Conception and the Assumption
…
okay, I found this which gives a good explanation for the meaning of the word Kecharitomene. I love it!! I never saw this one before but it’s the best and most complete explanation that I’ve seen so far. You can read the whole thing at the website but I put this section here;
Mary was most certainly saved by the grace of Jesus Christ;
in fact she was filled with His saving grace, which is why the
angel Gabriel called her “full of grace” (Luke 1:28). The Greek
term here is kecharitomene, from the verb charitoo, which
means “to fill or endue with grace”. (The root of this verb is the
noun charis, grace; the same word used in Ephesians 2:8,
Romans 11:6 and Acts 15:11, among other passages, to refer
to God’s saving grace.)
Kecharitomene is a perfect present participle of charitoo. A
perfect participle indicates an action completed in the past
with existing results, and a present participle denotes a
continuous, repeated action. So kecharitomene literally
means “one who was completed in grace in the past and who
continues to be full of grace”. Hence the traditional
translation “full of grace” is much more accurate than “highly
favored”, or any other such modern rendering.
The Bible never uses this particular tense of charitoo to refer
to anyone but the Virgin Mary! She alone among all human
persons is utterly embued with the grace of God. Since sin
and grace are opposed (Romans 5:20-21), and grace saves
us from sin (Eph 2:5, 8); Mary’s fullness of grace would
indicate a complete absence of sin (this is a biblical basis
for Catholic belief in Mary’s sinlessness).
This is obviously a gift she receives from God, since she does
not fill herself with grace. Are we to believe that He who began
this great work in Mary was unable to complete it (see
Philippians 1:6)? Did He utterly fill her with grace in the
beginning only to allow her to be damned in the end? No,
the Savior perfected His work in Mary; she is now in Heaven
with Him.
