allowed him to show his charisma. Gradually, around him formed a circle of persistent admirers, who aspired to confess and to receive communion exclusively from him. Almost all were women. Some of the admirers of John formed a sect of Ioannites. The head of the sect was the spiritual daughter of John, Matryona Ivanovna Kiseleva, who received in the sect the name of Porfiriia or the ″Theotokos″. The Ioannites believed that the world as they knew it was about to end, probably after the revolution, and that they could find salvation only by going to God in the person of Father John. Some taught that John was Prophet Elijah, others Jesus Christ, others God of Sabaoth. The Ioannites spread stories about the "miracles" performed by John, sold the objects related to him and Holy Water, which was sanctified by John himself. John established a special relief organization. It was called the "House of the Industry" and opened in Kronstadt in 1882. It had its own church, an elementary school for boys and girls, an orphanage, a hospital for anyone who came there, a boarding house, a free public library, shelter for the homeless that accommodated 40,000 people each year, a variety of workshops in which the impoverished could earn some money, a cheap public canteen that served about 800 free dinners on holidays and a hostel for the travelers. By the early 1890s, John had become well known, and people from all over Russia came to him every day in thousands. He practiced mass confessions during which thousands of people wiped out their sins and went into a frenzy, which was often accompanied by hysterics and tears. Even Tsar Alexander III of Russia in 1894 summoned Father John to Livadia Palace, in the Crimea, as Alexander lay dying of kidney disease. John claimed later that he had raised the dead but failed to heal the Tsar by his prayers. John came to a wide prominence after the publication of an open letter in the newspaper Novoe Vremya (literally New Time) in 1883. The publication was also a turning point in the relationship between John and his church authorities. In the open letter, 16 people told about their healing thanks to the prayers of Father John and swore, "Now live according to God's truth and go to Holy Communion as often as possible". Such a publication in a secular newspaper violated