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Dear catholic.com visitors: This Catholic Answers website, with all its free resources, is the world’s largest source of explanations for Catholic beliefs and practices. We receive no funding from the institutional Church and rely entirely on your generosity to sustain this website with trustworthy, accessible content. If every visitor this month donated $1, catholic.com would be fully funded for an entire year. If you’ve never made a gift, now is the time. Your donation will be matched dollar for dollar this week only. Thanks and God bless.
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If Mary was born without original sin and did not sin during her life, does that mean that she did not need to be saved by Jesus?

Question:

If Mary was born without original sin and did not sin during her life, does that mean that she did not need to be saved by Jesus?

Answer:

Christ’s death on the cross was an eternal event; as such, its graces could reach back in time, as well as forward. This means that the grace that Christ would win on Calvary could be applied to Mary in anticipation of Calvary. This was how she was saved from any stain of sin, both original and actual. Medieval theologians created the analogy of two people approaching a pit. If the first falls in and is rescued from the pit, and the second is prevented from falling into the pit, both are saved, and it even could be said that the one whose fall was prevented is saved far more completely than the one who was raised from the pit. See also Hail Mary, Conceived without Sin.

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