Venerable Mary of Egypt

Venerable Mary of Egypt is the greatest image of repentance in the Orthodox tradition. According to Church tradition she was born in Egypt in the mid-fifth century and at twelve left home for Alexandria, where she lived a dissolute life for seventeen years. Traveling to Jerusalem out of curiosity with pilgrims for the Feast of the Exaltation of the Cross, she found herself held back by an invisible force at the doors of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. Recognizing the sinfulness of her life, she turned in prayer to an icon of the Theotokos and vowed to renounce the world. Granted entry to venerate the Cross, she withdrew across the Jordan into the desert, where she spent about forty-seven years in complete solitude, severe fasting, and penitential prayer. Shortly before her death she was found by the elder Zosimas, who twice communed her with the Holy Mysteries and witnessed her miraculous gifts — walking on the waters of the Jordan and levitating in prayer. After her repose (traditionally around the year 522), Zosimas buried her body with the help of a lion that appeared. Her Life, written by St. Sophronius of Jerusalem, is read by the Church during Great Lent as the supreme example of repentance.