The Mary Undoer of Knots Novena

The Mary Undoer of Knots Novena is one of the great popular Marian devotions of the modern Catholic world. It takes its image from a 1700 painting in the Bavarian city of Augsburg, its theology from the second-century writings of Saint Irenaeus of Lyon, and its global diffusion from Pope Francis, who as Father Jorge Mario Bergoglio first encountered the devotion in Augsburg in 1986 and brought it to Argentina, where it became a major popular devotion before spreading worldwide during his pontificate.

Origin and history

In 1700, the Bavarian baroque painter Johann Georg Melchior Schmidtner completed an altarpiece for the Church of Saint Peter am Perlach in Augsburg. The painting depicts the Blessed Virgin Mary, surrounded by angels, untying knots in a long white ribbon. A particular angel hands her the ribbon at one end with all its knots intact; another angel receives the ribbon at the other end already smooth and unknotted. The image is profoundly theological: the knots represent the tangles of human sin and human suffering, and Mary, by her cooperation with the saving work of Christ her Son, undoes them.

The painting has its proximate occasion in a real family difficulty. The German nobleman Wolfgang Langenmantel, in 1615, brought the strained relationship of his marriage to a Jesuit priest, Father Jakob Rem, who placed the knotted marriage ribbon (the matrimonial ribbon used in Bavarian wedding custom) before an image of Our Lady. As Father Rem prayed, the knots gradually undid themselves; the marriage was restored. The story passed into family memory and gave rise, two generations later, to the commissioning of the Schmidtner painting by the Langenmantel family for the Augsburg church.¹

The theological foundation, however, is older than the seventeenth century. Saint Irenaeus of Lyon, in Against Heresies (Book III, chapter 22, paragraph 4), composed around AD 180, develops the doctrine of Mary as the New Eve: "Just as Eve, by disobeying, became the cause of death for herself and the whole human race, so Mary, having obeyed, became the cause of salvation for herself and the whole human race... The knot of Eve's disobedience was loosed by the obedience of Mary; what the virgin Eve bound by her unbelief, the Virgin Mary loosed by her faith." The image of the knot loosed by Mary is, in this primitive sense, the foundation of the entire devotion.

Pope Francis, then Father Bergoglio, encountered the Schmidtner painting during a trip to Augsburg in 1986. He was profoundly moved by it. He brought a holy card of the image to Argentina and began promoting the devotion in Buenos Aires, where in the 1990s and 2000s it became one of the major Marian devotions of the city. After his election to the papacy in 2013, the devotion spread rapidly across the Catholic world. Many parishes in the United States, Latin America, Europe, and the Philippines now have a Mary Undoer of Knots devotion, often celebrated on Saturdays or in connection with the eighth of December (the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception, when the painting is traditionally venerated).²

Structure of the Novena

The standard form of the Mary Undoer of Knots Novena, as preserved in the Argentine devotional tradition popularized by Pope Francis, is structured as follows:

1. Sign of the Cross and brief act of contrition.
2. The first three decades of the Rosary (often the Joyful Mysteries, or the day's mysteries by the day of the week), or alternatively three Hail Marys and a Glory Be.
3. A meditation on the day's theme: the recognition of a particular kind of knot, the bringing of it to Mary, the contemplation of her cooperation with Christ in undoing it.
4. The petition: the specific knot being entrusted to Mary on this day, named explicitly.
5. The principal prayer: Holy Mary, full of God's presence, Mother of love and mercy... (the prayer of the Argentine devotion).
6. The closing invocation: Holy Mary, Undoer of Knots, pray for us.

Daily themes through the nine days:

1. Awareness of the knots in my life
2. Asking for Mary's intercession
3. Recognizing the deepest knot of sin
4. The knot of family conflict
5. The knot of worry and anxiety
6. The knot of resentment and unforgiveness
7. The knot of addiction and habit
8. The knot of spiritual dryness
9. Surrender, and confidence in Mary's intercession

When the novena is prayed

The novena is not bound to a particular liturgical season. Catholics commonly pray it:

• In the nine days leading up to December 8, the Solemnity of the Immaculate Conception, since the knot of Eve's disobedience loosed by Mary's obedience is the specifically Immaculist theological foundation of the devotion.
• In the nine days leading up to a particular family decision or liturgical Marian feast (May 31, August 15, September 8).
• At any time for the specific intentions of family healing, the resolution of complicated situations, the recovery of marital peace, and the conversion of family members.

Theological foundations

The theological foundation of the Mary Undoer of Knots devotion is the Catholic doctrine of Mary's cooperation in the saving work of Christ. The Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches: "By her complete adherence to the Father's will, to his Son's redemptive work, and to every prompting of the Holy Spirit, the Virgin Mary is the Church's model of faith and charity" (CCC 967). Mary does not save us. Christ alone saves. But Mary cooperates with the saving work of her Son, and her cooperation continues from heaven through her motherly intercession for every member of the Church.

The Catechism continues: "This motherhood of Mary in the order of grace continues uninterruptedly from the consent which she loyally gave at the Annunciation and which she sustained without wavering beneath the cross, until the eternal fulfillment of all the elect. Taken up to heaven she did not lay aside this saving office but by her manifold intercession continues to bring us the gifts of eternal salvation. Therefore the Blessed Virgin is invoked in the Church under the titles of Advocate, Helper, Benefactress, and Mediatrix" (CCC 969, citing Lumen Gentium 62).

The Mary Undoer of Knots devotion stands within this Catholic theology of Marian mediation. The knots of our lives (the family conflicts, the addictions, the resentments, the impossibilities) are the contemporary forms of the knots Saint Irenaeus described as bound by Eve and loosed by Mary. The novena is the deliberate Catholic act of bringing those knots to her, in confidence that she who cooperated with Christ in the original loosening will cooperate with Him still in the loosening of the knots in our particular lives.³

Pairing the Mary Undoer of Knots Novena with other prayers

Catholics commonly pair the novena with:

• The Holy Rosary, particularly the Joyful Mysteries, which meditate on Mary's fiat at the Annunciation and her cooperation with Christ from the very beginning of the Incarnation.
• The Memorare of Saint Bernard of Clairvaux, which expresses the same desperate and confident trust in Mary's intercession.
• The Hail Holy Queen ( Salve Regina ), the closing antiphon of the Rosary.
• The Surrender Novena, particularly when the knots in question are causing severe interior anxiety.
• The Marian consecration of Saint Louis-Marie de Montfort, which formally entrusts the soul to Mary in a thirty-three-day preparation.

For the life of the Blessed Virgin Mary, see Mary, Mother of God. For the broader Catholic doctrine of the Communion of Saints, see the Communion of Saints.

Sources

Footnotes

1. The Schmidtner painting (1700) is preserved at the Church of Saint Peter am Perlach in Augsburg, Germany. The Langenmantel family history is documented in the parish records and in the standard Bavarian art-historical literature on the Augsburg baroque. Catholic Encyclopedia entries on the devotion, where included, are post-1986 and reflect the modern Argentine and global diffusion. ↩

2. Pope Francis (then Father Jorge Mario Bergoglio S.J.) brought the holy card of the Schmidtner painting to Argentina in 1986. The Buenos Aires diocesan history and the writings of Pope Francis (especially in Argentine collections) document the local diffusion of the devotion in the 1990s and 2000s. Vatican statements during the pontificate of Francis treat the devotion as part of the popular Marian piety the Pope wished to promote. ↩

3. Saint Irenaeus of Lyon, Against Heresies, Book III, chapter 22, paragraph 4 (composed c. AD 180). Catechism of the Catholic Church, paragraphs 484-511 (the conception of Christ in Mary), 963-975 (Mary in the Church and the Communion of Saints). Vatican II, Lumen Gentium, chapter 8, especially paragraphs 60-62. All available at vatican.va. ↩