St. John the Merciful — The Saint a Beggar Conned Three Times

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A beggar walked up to one of the most powerful
church leaders in the entire Christian world

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and asked for money. He got it. Then he changed
his clothes, ran ahead through the crowd, and

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asked the exact same man for money a second
time, pretending to be somebody else. He got

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that too. And when he tried it a third time,
this bishop's own servants finally recognized

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him and moved to chase him off. The bishop?
Well, he stopped them. gave the man even more

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than before and said, Perhaps he is Christ putting
me to the test.

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Hi, my name is John O'Connor and this is Everyday
Saints. This is episode 20. If you are new

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here, welcome to the porch, pull up a chair,
grab a cup of coffee or a lemonade and stick

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around. We look at a new saint every Thursday.
Before we finally get to today's story, two

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quick notes. One, my wife and I finally moved
back to North Carolina, still unpacking and

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getting situated. Unsure how this episode will
actually sound as the acoustics in here are

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different, but we will see. I'll likely send
it through an audio enhancer and see if that

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helps. The other thing, quick note, is that
keep an eye out for this coming Tuesday. I'm

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dropping a special bonus episode. It's a little
different from our usual format, and I'll tell

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you more about it at the end of this episode.
You have probably never heard this name before

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today. And here's a bonus. You are actually
getting two saints in one episode today. Not

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just one. Completely free of charge, I should
add. This is the story of Saint John the Merciful.

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And before we are done, we are going to meet
that second saint too. A monk under his care,

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whose story became the single hardest test
of everything John believed about mercy. John

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was born on the island of Cyprus, somewhere
around the year 550 or 560 AD. His father,

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held real power on the island, an important
government official. So John grew up around

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wealth and status most people never see. Following
his parents' wishes, John married young and

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had children of his own. By every measure, he
was set up for an ordinary, comfortable life

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as a nobleman's son. But then his wife died.
Following that, his children died too. The

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record doesn't dwell on the details of that
grief. But it doesn't have to. John responded

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to losing his entire family by turning toward
religious life. Not bitterly, not as a way

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of running from the world, but by pouring all
that love somewhere else instead. He became

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a monk. Word of his character spread. When the
position of Patriarch of Alexandria, one of

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the most powerful and prestigious offices in
the entire Christian world at the time, came

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open around the year 610 AD, the emperor and
the clergy of the city specifically asked for

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John by name. Now, what John did with that power
is quite remarkable, and it's not just one

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story. It's a whole pattern told and retold
by the people who watched him live it out.

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The office John now ran controlled enormous
wealth, money, land, even a shipping fleet.

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John treated all of it as something to be emptied
out, not preserved. He personally registered

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more than 7,000 of the poorest people in Alexandria
and arranged for them to be fed every single

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day out of church funds. He explained his own
approach to giving with a story from his youth.

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He said he had once had a vision of a beautiful
woman who told him she was compassion with

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a capital C. the eldest daughter of God, sent
to bring him closer to the Son of God himself

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than any other virtue could. He said he never
forgot her face or what she told him that day.

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And from that point on, mercy wasn't just something
he did when he felt like it. It was something

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he owed people every single time, not just when
it was easy. And there's something else worth

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knowing here too, because It shows how much
John's generosity actually cost him. Christians

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in his day were deeply divided, split into
rival camps over disagreements about their

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faith, serious enough to turn whole cities
against each other. Now, John belonged to one

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side of that divide. He easily could have limited
his famous charity to people who agreed with

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him, but he didn't. His stated policy and the
one he was remembered for was to help whoever

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showed up in need, no matter which side they
stood on. In a world where people often decided

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who deserved help based on whether they believed
the same things, that was itself a quiet, deliberate

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stand. That's the spirit behind the beggar story
you heard at the top of this episode. John

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didn't just tolerate being tested three times
by the same man in three different disguises.

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He assumed out loud that this might genuinely
be Christ testing him and decided that even

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a real chance of being played for a fool was
worth it. If it meant never once turning away

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someone who might actually be in need. He treated
merchants the same way. One man came to him

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after losing everything in the shipwreck. John
gave him the money to rebuild. The man's next

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venture, well, failed. And then he came back.
John gave again. When the same merchant lost

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a third ship, John didn't just hand him coins
this time. He gave the man an entire grain

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ship belonging to his official office, fully
loaded so the man could finally get back on

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his feet for good. John was not a pushover though,
and this part matters because it's easy to

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hear endlessly generous and assume easily used.
He had a close friend named Nicotas, a powerful

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government official under the emperor. At the
time, the empire, the eastern half of what

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used to be the old Roman empire, was deep in
a costly war against Persia. And Nicotas tried

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to divert some of the church's wealth toward
funding the fight. John refused flatly. He

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wasn't going to let the resources set aside
for Alexandria's poor get swept into a war

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budget, friendship, or no friendship. The disagreement
got serious enough that it specifically recorded

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and it ended with Nikitas backing down and apologizing.
When the Persian army sacked Jerusalem and

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drove the refugees flooding into Egypt, John
didn't wait to be asked. He organized supply

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convoys to the survivors near Jerusalem and
opened Alexandria to refugees fleeing the destruction.

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extending his sense of responsibility well past
the edges of his own city. But nothing tested

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how far John's mercy really went, quite like
a monk under his authority named Vitalis. Now,

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Vitalis had spent most of his life quietly inside
a monastery near Gaza. Then somewhere around

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the age of 60, he did something nobody expected.
He moved to Alexandria, and started keeping

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a list, the name and location of every prostitute
working in the city. He took a day job as a

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laborer and every single night he take that
day's wages straight to one of the women on

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his list. I want to be upfront with you here
because this is exactly the kind of detail

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where legend and verify history blur together.
Tradition says he'd pay the women enough to

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cover a night's lost income. and simply ask
her to rest, not to work if you catch my drift.

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While she slept, Vitalis stayed awake in the
corner, praying for her until morning, then

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left before sunrise to earn the money to do
it again the next night. As he approached each

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door, he reportedly announced loudly where he
was going, so no one could accuse him of hiding

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it. When people demanded to know what a monk
was doing at a brothel, He'd snap back. Have

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I not a body like everyone else? Mind your own
business. You can guess how that looked from

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the street. For years, Vitalis was mocked and
harassed. Devout Christians in the city were

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scandalized. Eventually, a group of clergy went
straight to John and demanded Vitalis be excommunicated.

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And this is where John's whole character gets
tested directly. He had every reason to act.

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Pressure from his own clergy. A scandal threatening
the church's reputation. A simple explanation

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sitting right there if he just wanted to condemn
the man. John refused. He wouldn't rule on

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rumor. He wouldn't sacrifice a man standing
without actual proof of wrongdoing. No matter

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how loud the accusations got or how long they
went on. Vitalis was killed years later,

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struck by a man who misunderstood exactly what
he was doing outside a brothel. It's unclear

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whether the attacker was a jealous client or
an outraged bystander. The record doesn't say

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for certain. What is recorded is what happened
after. As his body was carried through the

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city, the women whose names had been on his
list for years came forward one by one with

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candles and told the truth. Money so they wouldn't
have to work one night and a stranger who stayed

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awake praying for them until dawn, asking for
nothing in return. John himself led the funeral

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procession through the streets of Alexandria.
The same people who had spent years assuming

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the worst of Alphi Talas reportedly made themselves
a quiet promise that day. To stop judging so

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quickly based only on what things looked like
from a distance. John's years of patient refusal

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to condemn a man without proof had been right
all along. John didn't get to stay in Alexandria

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forever. When the Persians pushed further into
Egypt, threatening the city itself, John was

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forced to flee back to his home island of Cyprus,
the same place he'd left behind decades earlier.

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Tradition holds that he predicted his own death
shortly before it happened, telling those close

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to him that his time was near with the same
plain, unbothered acceptance He had shown

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toward every loss in his life up to that point.
He died there, not long after, having given

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away nearly everything that he had a power over,
ending his life with essentially nothing to

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his name. Even after his death, his story kept
moving in a way that feels fitting for a man

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who spent his whole life giving away what he
had instead of holding on to it. His relics

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were eventually taken to Constantinople, Then
centuries later to Budapest during a period

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of war and upheaval, and finally settled in
Venice where they still rest today in a church

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that bears his name. A man who gave away a whole
fortune that was never really his to keep,

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still in a sense, on the move himself long
after his death. All right, back to the porch.

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Here's what sits with me about John. He ran
two completely different kinds of risk in this

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story, and he was willing to take both of them.
with a beggar and the merchant, if you remember,

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his risk was generosity. Being fooled, giving
too much, looking naive. With Vitalis, his

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risk went the opposite direction entirely,
withholding judgment, refusing to act, and

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looking weak or complicit while an entire city
demanded he do something.

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Most of us are only really comfortable with
one of those risks. Some of us give freely

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but judge quickly. Happy to hand someone money,
but the second a rumor starts, we are ready

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to believe the worst and move on. Now others
of us are slow to judge but tight-fisted,

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patient with people's reputations but, uh-huh,
guarded with anything that actually costs us

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something. John did both at once, consistently,
for years, even when either one could have

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blown up in his face publicly. I think that's
the harder lesson here. It's not just be generous.

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It's not just don't judge people too fast either.
Both of those really come down to the same

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thing. Being willing to be wrong about someone.
Generosity risks getting fooled. Patience

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risks looking like you are covering for someone.
John took both of those ricks over and over

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because the alternative was shutting out people
who actually needed him. And I don't think

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this was easy for John. He wasn't just some
naturally trusting guy who never got bothered

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by any of it. He watched a beggar con him right
in front of him and gave anyway. He stood his

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ground against his own clergy for years regarding
Vitalis, looking weak, looking naive, with

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no idea if he would ever be proven right. That's
not something you decide once. He had to keep

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choosing it over and over, day after day. Long
before anybody found out he had been right

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all along. So, here's what I'm sitting with
this week. Where in your own life have you

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quietly decided that avoiding being fooled matters
more than actually helping somebody? And where

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have you decided it's safer to assume the worst
about someone than to risk being wrong in their

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favor? Hmm. It is now time for the closing prayer.
Lord, thank you for John and for a mercy that

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didn't need proof to act and a patience that
didn't need pressure to fold. For anyone listening

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who's grown guarded, tired of being taken advantage
of, soften that guard just a little, the way

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John's never fully closed. And for anyone who's
been the one misjudged, The way Vitalis was?

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Let them know that somewhere, someone is refusing
to believe the worst about them too. Amen.

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Saint John the Merciful is recognized as the
patron of Egypt and is remembered above all

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for his radical charity toward the poor. His
feast day is celebrated on November 12th in

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the Eastern Orthodox Church and January 23rd
in the Roman Catholic tradition. Saint Vitalis,

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the monk whose story we also just told, is recognized
as the patron saint of prostitutes and day

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laborers. His feast day falls on January 11th
in the Western Church and April 22nd in the

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Eastern Orthodox tradition. Well, that's episode
20. If this one changed how quick you are to

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judge or how tight you hold on to what you've
got, send it to somebody who needs to hear

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it. Before you go, this Tuesday, I've got a
special bonus episode coming, a bit different

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from our usual saint stories. It's something
I've wanted to sit down and talk through honestly

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for a while now. So keep an eye out for it.
And next week, we are back to a known name,

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one with a story from a war a lot closer to
living memory than you'd expect. I'm John O'Connor.

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Thanks for sitting on the porch with me, and
I will see you next week.