The “Wednesday” or “Mahim” Novena

Native Bombayites (or “Mumbaiites” if you prefer the official appellation, which I obviously don’t) know the novena to Our Lady of Perpetual Succour as either the “Wednesday” novena, since that is the day on which the services are held, or the “Mahim” novena, because services are held at St. Michael’s Church, Mahim (a Bombay neighborhood).

The keen-eyed among you would have noticed that I used the term “native Bombayites” which is more general than say Bombay Catholics. And therein lies the rub. Everyone in Bombay, Catholic or otherwise knows about the novena. Since in Pittsburgh, or anywhere in the world for that matter, it is hard for anyone to be more than one handshake away from a Bombayite, test this out: ask them, whatever their faith, whether they have heard of the Wednesday or Mahim novena, and if they haven’t, I will buy you a beverage of your choice!

Not only has the whole of Bombay heard of the novena, devotion to Our Lady of Perpetual Succour has transcended the Catholic flock and draws large numbers of people of all faiths. I have seen Hindus, Muslims, Sikhs, and Zoroastrians there, on a regular basis. In fact, it appears from visual inspection (very unscientific no doubt) that the majority of those attending the novena services are non-Catholic (and since in India, most Christians are Catholic, non-Christian as well).

To really appreciate how much faith people of all faiths have in Our Lady as intercessor, one must consider that Bombay has 2 seasons, hot and humid, and extremely hot and humid, and the human cattle cart (also called “Western” and “Central” railway) has two periods, peak and superpeak.

Most Bombayites, (like in other major metropolitan areas, no, Pittsburgh does not qualify) commute from North to South in the morning and from South to North in the evening, the afore-mentioned “superpeak” periods, when individual bodies in train compartments merge into contiguous gloms of hot, sweaty, smelly, sticky human flesh. It is under these circumstances that the teeming millions who love Mother Mary, after a hard’s day work, break their journey home, fight their way out of the train compartments, and negotiate the crowds on the sidewalk to enter the extremely over-crowded premises of St. Michael’s Church to attend the 30 minute long novena service, after which they will have to negotiate the crowds once again, make their way to Mahim station, wait for the train, insinuate themselves back into the fleshy glom, and then proceed home where they will have to cook, clean, attend to their kids and whatnot.

What strange force compels ordinary folks (not tri-athletes) to repeat this gruelling ordeal every week? Faith in a mother’s love. Our Lady is not just the Mother of Jesus, but to the non-Catholics, their mother, a universal mother, who most persuasively presents her children’s needs to God. To see thousands of people, at each of the 16 services (4 of which are in Indian languages) every Wednesday, clutching their novena booklets for dear life, and praying and singing lustily is uplifting, not just spiritually, but almost literally… you expect the roof of St. Michael’s to fly off with the power of the agglomerated fervour.

The beginning of my faith in the Mahim novena is unique yet perhaps not atypical. I used to take piano lessons with Mrs. Aida Francis (“Aunty Aida”) whose apartment building has a common wall with St. Michael’s church. In general, because of the novena-related traffic complications, she avoided having students who did not live within walking distance of her place, take their lessons on Wednesdays. But for reasons that I cannot recall, I was an exception and iron-manned it out to Mahim from Dadar, either by bus or taxicab (splurging my parents’ hard-earned money of course!). This was circa 1988-89. I had been going to Mass daily, more or less, for around 4-5 years and I thought I had faith and spirituality all figured out. (I still do!) So every Wednesday when I saw the throngs pouring out of St. Michael’s I would think, “Silly people. They think God is a shop-keeeper and will give them what they want in exchange for nine visits to the services. Don’t they know that the Christ’s words were ask, and you will receive? I don’t recall Him saying, ask my mother nine times and you will receive.”

And I continued to be content, smug, and condescending, till… Lo! And behold! The seed of a new idea began to germinate. What if I am wrong? What if there is something here that keeps these people coming back week after week?

After weeks of puzzling over this to no satisfactory conclusion, I decided to put the novena, and Our Lady to the test. I had just come off one of my most disappointing years. I had applied to the top 4 business schools in India and had been rejected by all 4. Not only that, gauging from my peers who had been accepted, I knew that my credentials were not strong enough to ever warrant admission to any of the top schools. So if Our Lady could get me admission, I would believe. And no, not admission to any of the top schools… that would not convince me, but to the #1 school in the country, the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad (IIMA). (According to a 2002 study by The Economist 2002 the hardest b-school to get admitted into, in the world with around 250 applicants per accepted student.) Founded in collaboration with Harvard Business School, and with a campus designed by the famed Chicago architect Louis Kahn, the school had an aura that far outshone its nearest rival, IIM Calcutta.

So that was my deal with Our Lady. You get me into IIMA and I will believe.
And as the rest, as they say, is history. Not only did IIMA admit me, none of the other top schools did! Go figure!

So 20 years later, here I am, thousands of miles away from Mahim, still praying the Wednesday novena, every Saturday with the rest of my fellowship buddies, and on other days of the week, individually in my office. I call it my “heavy artillery”. When I feel especially needy and daily Mass is not providing adequate strength, I turn to the little book that is my big gun, that fires my petition so strongly and compellingly that it has never failed to get results.

Thanks Mom.
Jonathan.