Mary of Egypt (Maria Aegyptiaca), was born in Egypt in 344. At the age of twelve, she ran away from her parents to the city of Alexandria where for seventeen years she lived an extremely immoral life. Being driven "by an insatiable and an irrepressible passion", Mary often refused money for sexual favors and instead lived off of money earned begging and spinning flax.
She traveled to Jerusalem for the Great Feasts of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross, not to worship but to find among the pilgrims more partners to satisfy her lust. But when she tried to enter the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, she was held back by an unseen force and denied entry. Recognizing her impurity was the cause and seeing an icon of the Theotokos (Virgin Mary) outside the church, Mary was struck with remorse, begging forgiveness and vowing to become an ascetic.
Attemping entry to the church again, Mary was allowed in. After venerating the True Cross, she heard a voice tell her “If you cross the Jordan, you will find glorious rest.” She went to a monastery on the bank of the River Jordan where she received absolution and Holy Communion. Crossing the river the next morning with only three loaves of bread, she spent the rest of her life as a penitent desert hermit, subsisting only on what she found in the wilderness.
St. Mary found glorious rest in her conversion and turning away from her sinful habits. ACT prays that women caught up in an addiction to pornography or other lustful lifestyles, will find their own River Jordan and turn to the Lord for forgiveness and glorious rest.