Last night in services at our church we did the annual Lenten reading of the story of St. Mary of Egypt. I had the honor of reading aloud in the service the entire account, which was written down by St. Sophronius, the patriarch of Jerusalem, in the 630s. The death of the saint it recounts occurred in 522; the amazing story had been passed down in oral tradition within the monastery whose hieromonk, Abba Zosimas, was central to the events. The Orthodox Church reads it in services every Lent because it is a stunning testimony to the power of repentance.
Here is a link to the entire story. It’s the tale of a monk in the early sixth century who went far out into the desert east of Jerusalem during Lent. There he found a scrawny old woman, naked, her skin almost charred-looking from the sun. The story picks up:
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