Knot by Knot

A nest of matted hair, twisted car seat straps, knotted shoelaces on the first day of school, or a favorite necklace in a mangled heap. Much of parenting involves untangling, organizing, and cleaning up after our children in order to keep them safe and comfortable or to fix their favorite things.

If you’ve ever worked on untangling a stubborn knot, you know that tugging—even in the direction you think is right—often makes it tighter. You will get nowhere without patience, perseverance, and careful observation—and, hopefully, good lighting!

Parenting asks us to be master detanglers not only in our physical realities as we tend to our children’s wants and needs, but also in the emotional landscapes of our families. We bear not only the responsibility of helping our children to untie their own emotional knots, but of unknotting our own feelings of frustration and exhaustion from the way we treat our families. As parents, the strength of our love and the limits of our power in this life often exist in painful tension.

Our feelings are not the arbiters of reality—they do not have to direct our actions. If we can unknot our will from our often fleeting emotions, we will be all the better for it, able to speak gently when angry or take courageous leaps when anxious. We certainly are more discerning, more rational, and often more faithful individuals when the knots of our hearts are not blocking us from living our faith in an outward, actionable manner. Perhaps one of the greatest gifts we can give our children is to be an example of this behavior.

Of course, that is easier said than done.

The Mary Undoer of Knots Novena refers to the “ribbons of life” that the evil one seeks to take from us. Some knots in the ribbons are smaller and easier to tease out. Others are so impossible to untangle that we might be liable to toss the ribbon in a drawer and just give up. Like all our problems, the best answer to these knots is free and always available to us, because it lies in prayer.

Our lives and those of our children weave above and beneath one another, forming a hopefully tightly woven fabric. But they are ultimately separate ribbons. We cannot undo every knot for them just by proximity of heart and soul. None of us will ever be immune to painful traumas, griefs, and wounds, or to the messy tangles of complex family dynamics.

Arriving at the conclusion that we lack total control over our children’s lives—or our own—is a beautiful thing because it is a freeing thing. There is someone who can help us to untangle our will from our pain or stress, whether a daily upset or the loss of a lifetime. As she holds our pain, she passes us from her hands to those of her loving Son, who offers us true restoration.

Mary, Undoer of Knots

In the original painting of Mary as Undoer of Knots, she holds a flowing white ribbon with a gentle, focused confidence. One end is crowded with knots while the half that has passed through her hands drapes freely through her fingers. Angels flank her, holding either side of the ribbon. She typically crushes the serpent underfoot. In this month’s edition of the Full of Grace Youth Journal, our cover offers a new perspective of challenging beauty—the body of the serpent underfoot is part of the “ribbon,” transforming into a knotted red yarn as it reaches Mary’s hands, and then into a golden rosary as it passes through her grasp. She appears to be in the Garden of Eden, and though the serpent’s mouth is open, fangs bared just beneath her bare foot, her face has a peaceful focus.

Like all her titles, Mary as Undoer of Knots flows from her relationship with her Son and His work as Savior. We find foreshadowing of Mary’s relationship to her Son in the Old Testament queens whose influence over the king was instrumental in solving problems. The ultimate example of Mary as Undoer of Knots is her cooperation with God’s plan to send His only Son for our salvation. Mary undid the knot of Eve’s disobedience and Christ undid the knot of Adam’s first sin. Mary’s fiat opened a place in the world for Christ, the One who releases us from the knots of sin and death.

Mary’s motherhood was not a life free from tangled circumstances. From the foot of the Cross, she saw her misunderstood, ridiculed, and rejected Son suffer and was powerless to stop it. As parents, we can see her faith as a corrective example: no matter what a parenting book or psychological study tells you, nothing we do can guarantee a child’s health, happiness, or success. Even she, having been preserved from sin from the first moment of her conception, was not granted control over her Son’s fate as a “reward” for sinless parenting. Her holiness was revealed in her willingness to cooperate with God at every turn.

Cooperation Is Not Passivity

We imagine Mary working patiently to set free what is hers to untangle, entrusting the finished work to the Father who would never abandon her. As we surrender, we must also take account of what we ourselves need to do in cooperation with that surrender according to our circumstances, whether that includes initiating a difficult conversation, seeking counsel, or making concrete plans to change ourselves. Always, this cooperation includes bolstering our prayer life.

Mary as Undoer of Knots reminds us of the worth we have in our identity within her Son, teaching us to pay closer attention and become more receptive to His mercy and His Sacred Heart even amid trial. She can help us to rein in our panic and pain so that we might see clearly, exchanging emotional heat for faithful attention. The question, she reminds us as she unties this first knot, is What is the next thing God is asking of me? How can I work through one knot at a time?

If there is a particular knot weighing on you or your family this month, write it down. Place it in Mary’s hands by beginning the Mary Undoer of Knots Novena. For nine days, ask her to show you what is yours, help you to surrender to her Son what is not, and help you uncover the patience not to tug.

Remember as you focus on this knot: God sees the whole ribbon of your life. He knows the origin of every thread in ways you could only imagine. May you feel His love as He takes it from your hands.

Virgin Mary, Mother of fair love, Mother who never refuses to come to the aid of a child in need, Mother whose hands never cease to serve your beloved children because they are moved by the divine love and immense mercy that exist in your heart, cast your compassionate eyes upon me and see the snarl of knots that exists in my life. You know very well how desperate I am, my pain, and how I am bound by these knots. Mary, Mother to whom God entrusted the undoing of the knots in the lives of his children, I entrust into your hands the ribbon of my life. No one, not even the evil one himself, can take it away from your precious care. In your hands there is no knot that cannot be undone. Powerful Mother, by your grace and intercessory power with Your Son and My Liberator, Jesus, take into your hands today this knot.

Access the full novena at Ascension Press.