Last year, my son was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes.
One star, do not recommend.
As we are self-employed, we regularly find ourselves at odds with the health care system, not fitting neatly into its preferred boxes. Ben’s diagnosis brought forth a host of new doctors, bills, and medical supplies like insulin, needles, and continuous glucose monitors that need to be swapped out every two weeks. My wife took on navigating the financial aspects of this new reality, and it quickly became overwhelming.
Eventually, she began praying a novena to Mary Undoer of Knots.
The Church offers a smorgasbord of novenas, which are simply prayers that represent a nine-day commitment to pray intently in some prescribed fashion.
This particular novena was a favorite of Pope Francis and originated with a painting created by a German artist in the 1700s, inspired by a true story of Mary’s intercession.
On the brink of divorce, German nobleman Wolfgang Langenmantel sought counsel from Jesuit priest Father Jakob Rem. At each meeting, they prayed to the Blessed Virgin Mary for his marriage to Sophie.
At their final meeting on September 28, 1615, Wolfgang brought the wedding ribbon that had bound the couple together during their ceremony as a symbol of unity.
Father Rem held it beside an image of Our Lady of the Snows and asked Mary to “untie the knots” of Wolfgang’s marriage. The ribbon loosened, became completely untied, and turned brilliant white. Wolfgang and Sophie subsequently reconciled.
Their grandson, Father Hieronymus Langenmantel, later commissioned a painting commemorating the story.
Centuries earlier, St. Irenaeus wrote about the parallel between Eve and Mary, describing how “the knot of Eve’s disobedience was loosed by the obedience of Mary. For what the virgin Eve had bound fast through unbelief, this did the virgin Mary set free through faith.”
In the painting, Mary is surrounded by angelic helpers who present her with a ribbon riddled with knots. Another angel is at her side, receiving the untangled ribbon Mary has freed from knots. Meanwhile, Our Lady stands on the crescent moon (the usual way of showing her title of the Immaculate Conception), her head crowned by a circle of stars, and she casually tramples the head of a “knotted” snake, representing the devil.
A German nun once sent Jorge Mario Bergoglio a Christmas card with the image. He then sent seminarians with copies of the image to the slums of Buenos Aires, where the faithful were overwhelmed by the depiction of Mary as a problem-solver.
Then-Cardinal Bergoglio had this image engraved on a chalice he presented to then-Pope Benedict XVI. Bergoglio eventually became Pope Francis, who continued to popularize the devotion, and the Argentine people presented him another chalice with the image, made by the same silversmith.
I don’t know how many novenas my wife prayed for help with our medical bills, but it was a lot.
Eventually, what felt like miraculous events began to happen; before long, the paperwork seemed to resolve itself, and the financial burden on our family was lifted.
Now Kim is a zealous advocate for Mary under her title “Undoer of Knots,” and keeps a handful of holy cards on hand at all times to spread the word.
She regularly turns to Our Lady for help with problems of all sizes.
Some might wonder why bother going to Mary at all. Why not just go straight to Jesus, the source?
The thing is, praying to Mary isn’t instead of going to Jesus — it’s asking her to go to Jesus with us and for us. It’s no different than asking a friend to pray for you. Well, except that Mary is Jesus’ mom, is in Heaven, and completely united to God, which makes her intercession even more powerful.
One thing I’ve wondered about is why it can take so long for a knot to get untied. Is it because some knots are more complicated? Are they too hard for her?
I think it comes down to this: A novena is not a blank check for God to do whatever we want.
Prayer isn’t meant to change God. It’s to change us.
The reason it takes time to see results in prayer is not that Mary can’t do it more quickly.
It’s because of the work that’s done in us while we wait.
Mary’s main goal is for us to become more like her Son. Sometimes the best way for that to happen is for us to become more patient, or grow in perseverance. And sometimes our hearts need to be transformed to accept the outcome that’s best for our soul.
Of course, God knows what we need and what we want, yet He still encourages us to ask Him for what we want.
If you’re mired in a particularly complicated situation, I know what Kim would suggest.
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