When it is said
It belongs to no church service, but a Russian prayer book prints it as the prayer of one who gives alms.
Say it before you give, whether a coin to someone on the street or a gift to a charity.
Where it comes from
Author known
He came home barefoot
From his first years as a priest at St Andrew’s Cathedral in Kronstadt, John shopped for food for the poor, fetched their medicine and often gave them his last few coins. People in the town would see him walking home without his priest’s robe. Parishioners often took shoes to his wife and told her, “Your husband has given away his shoes to someone, and will come home barefoot.”
Orthodox Church in America, The Life of St John of Kronstadt
The rest of the diary entry
The prayer book prints only part of this entry in his diary. In the full entry he also asks God to turn his eyes away from hard-hearted people who meet poverty with indifference and call it shameful names. He says such people weaken his heart, so that he too might harden it against the poor. At the end he asks God to raise up a house for the poor in his town, a prayer he had made many times. A note in brackets adds that it was built.
My Life in Christ, translated by E. E. Goulaeff (1897), on Azbyka.ru; My Life in Christ in Russian, volume 2 (1893), on Azbyka.ru
A diary in print
John kept the diary for many years. Printed in Russian as My Life in Christ, it went through eight editions in his lifetime. With John’s permission it was translated into English by E. E. Goulaeff and brought out by a London publisher in 1897.
My Life in Christ in Russian, on Azbyka.ru; My Life in Christ, translated by E. E. Goulaeff (1897), on archive.org
The Scripture in it
Each one should give what he has decided in his heart to give, not out of regret or compulsion. For God loves a cheerful giver.
And the King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of Mine, you did for Me.’
Bible text: Berean Standard Bible, public domain.
In Russian
Господи! Научи меня подавать милостыню охотно, с лаской, с радостью, и верить, что, подавая ее, я не теряю, а приобретаю бесконечно больше того, что подаю.
Господи, да идёт всякая милостыня моя в пользу, а не во вред!
Господи, приемли Сам милостыню в лице нищих Твоих людей!
From Azbyka.ru’s Russian prayer book, from his diary My Life in Christ.