I’ve never been to California, but have an icon of St John of Shanghai that was placed and blessed on his holy Relics.
St John Maximovych was born in Poltava in Ukraine and was the direct descendant of St John Maximovych, Metropolitan of Tobolsk and all Siberia who lived in the 18th century and who translated the Divine Liturgy into Chinese.
St John of Shanghai and of San Francisco celebrated his Namesday on his ancestor’s feastday, June 23rd (St John of Tobolsk and All Saints of Siberia).
For about 40 years St John of Shanghai did not sleep in a bed but in a chair or on the floor. A great ascetic, he would carry a very large icon of Our Lady of Kursk (covered and fastened around his neck by a strap). He would go barefoot and would celebrate services in the middle of busy streets in Paris and other places. The Roman Catholic priests of Paris would call him “St Jean nus pieds” or “St John the Barefoot” and would even point him out to people as proof of the existence of God . . .
Like his enterprising missionary family, St John founded the French Orthodox Church, the Netherlands Orthodox Church and ordained the first Spanish Orthodox priest. He was very interested in the Rites of the Western Church and had approved a reconstructed Gallican Rite which he liked to celebrate himself. He also insisted on returning many Western saints to the Orthodox calendar, Celtic et alia, and the ROCOR Synod approved these for inclusion into the calendar.
He also celebrated the Divine Liturgy in Chinese, following the translation of his ancestor, St John of Tobolsk (Tobolsk can boast other Ukrainian Metropolitans, including St Theophilus Leschynsky, St Paul Koniuskevych and St Anthony Stakhovsky).
He founded an orphanage for Chinese, Filipino, Ukrainian and Russian children and moved it from the Philippines to California before the Japanese invasion of the Philippines (St John would make an excellent Eastern patron Saint of the Philippines and of Eastern Orthodox and Eastern Catholics there!).
He promoted the canonization by the ROCOR of several saints, including St Herman of Alaska (an ethnic Ukrainian as well who signed his name using the Ukrainian “G” that the
Russians not only did not have, but also tried to get Ukrainians to stop using . . .).
His tomb at his Cathedral on Geary Blvd. was the site of many miracles of healing, including healing from blindness experienced even by non-Christians.
He was soon declared a local Saint in California and then was glorified a Saint by the ROCOR. When the Russian Church Abroad reunited with the Moscow Patriarchate, St John of Shanghai and San Francisco became a universal Saiint of Orthodoxy. When he was canonized by ROCOR, his canonization was celebrated around the world with services conducted in many languages, including Roumanian and Serbian, French, Dutch and Spanish, etc.
He is called the “Apostle of the Diaspora” and he certainly was that. I read about an Episcopal parish in the U.S. that went on pilgrimage to visit his tomb and became so enamoured with St John and his life that they began a petition to have their parish patron changed to “St John of San Francisco!”
His cultus is popular and spreads over confessional lines. There is no reason why he cannot be venerated, even liturgically, by Eastern Catholics.
When the ethnic Ukrainian martyr, St Maria Skobtsova (Elizabeth Pilenko) was canonized in Paris for her heroism in the face of Nazi terror, the then Archbishop of Paris, himself of Jewish background whose mother perished in the Holocaust, attended that canonization and later told the press that St Maria should be venerated in the Roman Catholic Church as well. He himself took a blessed icon of St Maria of Paris home with him.
May the Holy Hierarch Saint John Maximovych, Archbishop of Shanghai and of Western America, the Apostle of the Diaspora, pray unto God for us!
Alex
We had our once a month Sat. morning Divine Liturgy yesterday which conflicted with the Divine Liturgy at the Cathedral. We enthusiastically venerated his Icon and celebrated his Feastday in our much more humble temple and Father gave a wonderful homily about the Miracle-worker of Shanghai & San Francisco. 
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