Our Lady Undoer of Knots Block Print- Feast Day 9/28

You have probably seen this painting of Our Lady, Undoer of Knots before, but do you know the story of its origin? Around four hundred years ago, a couple from Germany named Wolfgang and Sophie Langenmante were experiencing struggles in their marriage. Wolfgang went to his parish priest, Fr. Jakob Lem, and asked his advice for how to help their marriage.

Fr. Lem was inspired to to tell the Langenmantes to ask Mary to untie the knots in their relationship. Through Mary’s intercession, they went on to have a happy and holy marriage. Years later, in gratitude for his grandparents’ faithful marriage, their grandson commissioned a painting of Mary untying a tangled ribbon of knots. In addition to the untangled ribbon, the artist also showed Mary stepping on a knotted-up snake, demonstrating that Satan twists and tangles and misleads us. The painting was donated to their local church, where you can still see it today.

The Feast of Our Lady, Undoer of Knots is celebrated on September 28th. We can ask Mary to help us face little problems and also to aid us in untangling big challenges.

St. Irenaeus wrote: 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.

When I was working on my Names of Mary block carving collection a few years ago, I included my own version of the Undoer of Knots image. I'd like to share a 5x7 printable from that project with you! This image was originally hand drawn by me, transferred to a rubber block, carved out, and then printed like a stamp. This is a true scan of that print that you are welcome to hang as art in your home or classroom or use as a feast day decoration!

Click here for the print:

And you can also find it included on these Names of Mary Bookmarks:

And if you are interested in more info on Our Lady Undoer of Knots, the devotion has a whole chapter in my book Through the Year with Mary! Complete with a kid friendly explanation, full color artwork with discussion prompts, reflection questions, a prayer, and a connection to Jesus, the goal of the book is to help you have good conversations with your kids! Fun fact- the block carving image I created actually ended up in my book! Even though all of the other art (around 50 full color images!) are all classic sacred art or photos of statues/stained glass, we couldn't find a high enough resolution image of the original Undoer of Knots painting. So my artwork is full page and the original painting is a smaller image include in the info on the next page. Not something that was planned, but my editor and team were grateful I had something on hand that was ready to be used!

Click here to find in from my publisher the St. Paul Center or here to find it on Amazon!