St. John Of Beverly

 The Saint of the Day for May 7 is St. John Of Beverly.

Bishop of Hexham, and later of York; born in Harpham, Yorkshire, died in Beverly on May 7, 721.

John manifested a strong desire to devote his life to God as a youth and left his native Yorkshire for Kent where he studied at the famous ecclesiastical school of St. Theodore, archbishop of Canterbury.

He returned toYorkshire on the completion of his studies and joined a Benedictine monastery where he devoted himself to contemplation. He was called out of his monastic seclusion to be consecrated bishop of Hexham in 687, a see he occupied for 18 years while still managing to devote time to contemplation and the study of Scripture.

On the death of St. Bosa, archbishop of York, he was transferred to York and served there until his retirement from ill health in 717. He spent his last four years in a monastery he built at Beverly.

He was renowned for the miracles he performed during his life and those that took place after his death. Most famously, he cured a young man who was dumb and had reportedly never spoken a word in his life, and obtained for him the ability to speak. He took the youth under his wing and patiently taught him the alphabet and the fundaments of the language.

After his death in 721, owing to the many miracles that occurred under his intercession, his burial site at beverly became one of the most popular pilgrimage sites in England. He was canonized by Pope Benedict IX in 1037.

The renowned English mystic, Julian of Norwich, and the martyred bishop, St. John Fisher, who was from Beverly, had a great devotion to St. John.