Giovanni Was A Saint

GIOVANNI WAS A SAINT

In a small country village in Sicily, there were two brothers, renowned members of the local Mafia. They were mean, bad and very rich. No one had a good word to say about them. Indeed, everyone seemed to have a story about how they had either been cheated or maligned by the brothers.

One day, one of the brothers, Giovanni, died. The surviving brother, Luigi - with a rare touch of conscience - felt that something nice should be said about his brother Giovanni at the funeral. So he went to the local vicar and said, "I know that folk in the village hate us, you don’t know the half of what we have been up to. However, I want you to say something nice about him at his funeral. I want you to say that Giovanni was a saint when you preach at his funeral. If you agree to do that, I‘ll show my gratitude by giving 100,000 Euros towards the repair of the church. And here’s the cheque for the amount. If you don’t, you’ll be in big trouble with me!"

The vicar thought about it for a minute, agreed and cashed the cheque for 100 thousand Euro.

Word soon got out about the deal. And a week later, the whole village turned out for the funeral, because everyone wondered what the vicar would say.

After the opening hymns had been sung and the readings had been read, the vicar climbed up into the pulpit and delivered his sermon. Eyeing Luigi, sitting in the front row, the vicar said how evil the pair of them had been. He went on to say how Giovanni had cheated, not only in business but on his wife, how he had lied and how had had no concern for anyone but himself. In fact he went on to say what a downright scoundrel Giovanni had been.

After ten minutes of preaching in this vein, the vicar, being a man of his word, ended his sermon by simply saying, "But compared to his brother, Luigi - Giovanni was a saint."