Juan Macías was born in Ribera del Fresno, Spain, in 1585. At the age of 34, he set out for America, traveling through Colombia and Ecuador until he arrived in Lima, where he joined the Order of Preachers as a lay brother at the Monastery of Saint Mary Magdalene. For twenty-two years, he served as the monastery's doorkeeper, always helping the poor and needy. Inspired by Saint Martin de Porres, he cared for the poor of Lima. He would travel around the city on a donkey, distributing bread and food to them. The miracle that led to his canonization occurred in 1949 in Olivenza, Spain, when a soup kitchen chef, who had run out of rice while preparing food, asked for his intercession, and the rice he was preparing multiplied in an inexplicable way, feeding all the hungry.