The Egyptian Nun Saint Sarah
March 23, 2023
The righteous and ascetic Saint Sarah the nun who was a native of upper Egypt departed on March 24. Her parents were Christians. They had no other children and had raised her in a Christian manner by teaching her reading holy scriptures and writing word of God. For this, she habited to always read the holy books of the Church. She frequently read especially “the biography and sayings of the fathers the monks.” She was amazed by their lives and desired the ascetic life. She went to one of the convents of upper Egypt and dwelt there for many years serving the virgins.
After that, she put on the monastic garb, persisting on fighting the lust of Satan for thirteen years until Satan was weary of her. When the devil was infuriated by her chastity and diligence, he wished to overthrow her by the sin of pride. So, he appeared to her when she was stood praying on the roof of her cell and said: “Rejoice for you have overcome Satan.” She replied: “I am a feeble woman and I cannot conquer you except by the power of the Lord Christ” Saint Sarah defeated Satan and so then he vanished.
This Egyptian nun had many valuable sayings she told the other nuns. One of her sayings was: “I never set my foot upon the step of the ladder, and I never go up to the next step without thinking I may die before I raise my leg so that the enemy might not entice me with the hope of a long life.” The other prominent saying of her is: “It is better for a man to show mercy even to satisfy men for the time will come that it will be to satisfy God.”
Saint Sarah had many other sayings as well written in the Paradise of the Fathers. She remained for sixty years on the banks of the river in a cave fighting a great fight. There is no one who saw her until her eighty years of age which she then departed.
May her prayers be with us, Amen.
Source: Coptic Synaxarium