The life of St Iraida of Alexandria
Going out one day to draw water from a well near the sea, she saw a ship come to shore carrying a company of Christians bound in chains, priests and deacons and monks among them, women and maidens too, being taken away to torture and death for their confession of Christ. When she learned who they were and where they were bound, a longing rose in her heart to share their fate.
She set down her water jars where they stood, went aboard the ship, and declared herself a Christian as well. She was bound with the others and carried with them to the Egyptian city of Antinoopolis. There, after undergoing torments, Iraida was the first of the company to be beheaded, and the rest followed her in giving their lives for Christ not long after. She is remembered as a virgin martyr of the persecution under Diocletian, honored for the courage that turned an ordinary errand into a following after the very Christians she had set out only to see.
