Our Lady of Perpetual Help Is Always There for Us

God works through His mother.

We were trying to buy a house. What we didn't expect was how hard it would be to succeed in securing a house. It became a journey that included Our Lady of Perpetual Help.

We sold our own home of tweny-five years and decided to live with my adult son in another state until we found a place to live. It made sense at the time.

The panic settled in after my spouse and I had bid on a third property and we were again outbid. It wasn't that we were outbid by a lot, so it seemed like we were in some sort of shift in the way houses were being bought and we just couldn't win without someone helping us.

As we discussed what had gone wrong, I noticed there was a small icon of Our Lady of Perpetual Help hanging over the cash register of the pizza restaurant where we were dining. Instantly I calmed down. I told my spouse to look at the icon and said something to the effect that God was with us and Our Lady would find us a house.

I never thought we would be entering a journey that would take us two years to complete. But every step of the way we ended up seeing an icon of Our Lady of Perpetual Help.

When I lived in my old house I had gotten pretty comfortable. I had a circle of friends and never really met a lot of new people. I sort of had a narrow focus. Sometimes God pushes us out of that comfort zone by difficult means. By being forced to rent we ended up meeting people we would have never have met otherwise and praying for souls of their departed. It is funny how God always puts you where He wants you to do work for Him. And it is a good thing we can't see past the bend in the road or we would never have started the journey if we had.

It was not a coincidence that we rented a place in a town where the Catholic church had an icon of Our Lady of Perpetual Help. That icon helped us have hope that we would eventually find a house to buy. But in the meantime I met my neighbor who was a lovely elderly women. Through talking to her over the course of the year we rented I found out her son died of a drug overdose in his mid-thirties. I think Our Lady wanted us to pray for him.

Over the summer my college-aged son stayed with us and took a job at an ice cream shop. He really liked his boss. One day as they were talking as she always did with the team of teens she employed she mentioned that her sixteen-year-old daughter had died in an auto accident five years before. As I lost my own mom in an auto accident when I was a teen, I thought to ask for her intercession for this family. To this day I remember her daughter in my prayers.

Renting again after so many years was a challenge for me. I really didn't like our landlord as he kept showing up when he was not welcomed like Thanksgiving night. I suppose my prayers for him were a lot less than perfect. He didn't renew our lease after the year so we had to move again. So we moved on to another rental (enduring all the trouble that it took to move) as we continued to bid on houses. We were up to eight.

It had gotten to the point I had thought we would never find a house and would rent forever. Yet Our Lady of Perceptual Help icons kept popping up here and there. She hadn't forgotten about us!

Almost by accident my spouse was looking on Zillow and noticed a house had come on the market in the town that I had grown up in. I knew the house and the people who had lived there. So we called the Realtor and made plans to see it the next day. It was Ash Wednesday.

As we toured the house (which needed some work) I walked into the living room and noticed hanging on the wall was an icon of Our Lady of Perpetual Help.

I think that was the reason we put a bid on it on the spot. This was before the five calls came in the following day to view the house. Had my husband not seen the house so quickly we probably would not have been able to even see the property before someone else bought it. I credit Our Lady's intercession!

As we took our final walk through of the house the icon of Our Lady of Perpetual Help was left behind to my delight. I had requested it be a part of the closing contract but the underwriter was very particular about the value of art and so we took that out of the contract. In all honesty I doubt anyone could ever fully comprehend the value of Our Lady of Perpetual Help. And no insurance plan would be able to replace her. So it is a good thing that the icon was left it behind as an “accident.” The happiest things in life are best perhaps because we stumble into them. Even if we don't know where we are going, God does. And behind the scenes Our Lady of Perpetual Help is there to guide us.

I guess calling on Our Lady of Perpetual Help is kind of like calling 911. She is always there waiting to help us. And Mary can take on every urgent prayer, even the smaller ones like finding a home.