Mary full of grace; Jesus advanced in grace

[jdemelo]

As a Catholic I am absolutely faithful to the Church. No problem there. I believe all she holds.

Luke 2:52 says Jesus grew in ‘charis’
John 1:14 says Our Lord was full of grace (pleres charis)

Luke 1:28 - I like to translate: Hail, full of grace (latin gratia plena)

How can Jesus be described by Luke as growing in grace, and Mary as full of grace?

This was posed to me by a friend, and its a fair question.
God Bless

 

[Des]

As a Catholic I am absolutely faithful to the Church. No problem there. I believe all she holds.

Luke 2:52 says Jesus grew in ‘charis’
John 1:14 says Our Lord was full of grace (pleres charis)

Luke 1:28 - I like to translate: Hail, full of grace (latin gratia plena)

How can Jesus be described by Luke as growing in grace, and Mary as full of grace?

This was posed to me by a friend, and its a fair question.
God Bless

I believe it is very fair to say that Mary, though always having an abudance of Grace from God, likewise had to Grow in this Grace as well as She aged. It is not like God’s Graces were not always there but Mother Mary, being a human, still needed to Grow in them.

eg. Like a baby growing in a pair of shoes that were much too large to fit into to begin with. The large shoes were there already, yet the infant still needed to grow in them.

 

[George_Craft]

eg. Like a baby growing in a pair of shoes that were much too large to fit into to begin with. The large shoes were there already, yet the infant still needed to grow in them.

That’s a great analogy Des, I’d like to expand on it if I may please.

I don’t know if this makes any sense, but I’m gonna give it a shot.

Jesus came to us as God in flesh.

Mary was fully human, no Divine aspect to her physically.

The amount of grace that Mary could receive as human in comparison to the amount that Jesus as God could contain would be beyond comprehension.

A small amount of the grace that Jesus had would “overshadow or make full of” a mere human, while Jesus as He grew would grow in His own grace as He came to understand more of His divine nature. Jesus grace had no limits.

I hope I’m not too confusing with this line of thinking. It’s tough to put into words.

With love,
George

 

[Des]

Yeah George Craft, that sounds fine too. Here is another analogy I think that could make sense of this. You take a cup of water to the bottom of a swimming pool that is full of water itself. The water in the pool is the Graces of God given to Mary. Now as she ages and grows in Wisdom, the Cup being surrouned in this pool of water, continues to grow larger though always remaining full. It is not like the Graces started off small then got bigger, but they were always there waiting for Her till She aged in maturity. This is the same that happened with Christ though His cup would grow infinitely. He would Grow in God’s Graces that awaited Him.

I dunno…am I even making sense? If another Catholic believes I’m way off here I encourage you to correct me cause I always want to learn.

 

[Liberian]

Luke 2:52 says Jesus grew in ‘charis’
John 1:14 says Our Lord was full of grace (pleres charis)

Luke 1:28 - I like to translate: Hail, full of grace (latin gratia plena)

How can Jesus be described by Luke as growing in grace, and Mary as full of grace?

J Demelo,

One thing to keep in mind is that the statement to Mary was to a (more-or-less) adult and was a sort of “snapshot” of her state at that time. The statement that Jesus “grew in grace” described His childhood and youth, the process of growing up.

• Liberian