This devotion is not new, infact, it is more than 300 years old! It is not based on an apparition of Our Blessed Mother but started as a painting by Johann Melchior Georg Schmittdner around 1700. The painting was inspired by a meditation of St. Irenaeus: “Eve, by her disobedience, tied the knot of disgrace for the human race; whereas Mary, by her obedience, undid it”. 

The knots represent our difficulties and struggles in life that we do not see an end to: family issues, violence, hurt between husband and wife, addiction, sickness, unemployement, lonliness, fear, anything that makes us despair... the knots of our life. These knots suffocate our souls and separate us from God.