Saint Aloysius Gonzaga

Religious, Patron of Catholic Youth
(1568–1591)

Saint Aloysius Gonzaga was born on March 9, 1568, in the castle of Castiglione delle Stiviere in Lombardy, the eldest son of the Marquis of Castiglione and a lady-in-waiting to the Queen of Spain. He was destined from birth for a career of military command and courtly distinction, and as a small child he was placed among the pages of the great noble households of northern Italy and Spain. Yet from his very earliest years it was apparent that his heart was set on higher things.

He had barely learned to speak before he was reciting prayers. At the age of seven he had already adopted strict penances and spent long hours before the Blessed Sacrament. At nine he made a vow of perpetual chastity, and throughout his short life he preserved a purity of soul so extraordinary that his confessor, Saint Robert Bellarmine, declared that he had never committed a mortal sin. His physical beauty was matched by a purity of heart that all who knew him found almost supernatural.

When he was about seventeen years old, Aloysius made the momentous decision to renounce his title and inheritance and enter the Society of Jesus. His father, the Marquis, was furious, and for two years resisted his son's vocation with every means at his disposal, sending him from court to court and seeking to distract him with worldly honours and pleasures. Aloysius bore all this with perfect patience and humility, never wavering in his resolution. Finally his father gave his consent, and in 1585 Aloysius entered the Jesuit novitiate in Rome, placing his marquessate in the hands of his younger brother.

In the novitiate and during his subsequent studies, Aloysius gave himself to prayer, study, and mortification with a fervour that alarmed his superiors, who had to moderate his penances for the sake of his health. He was already suffering from a kidney disease that would shorten his life. When a plague broke out in Rome in 1590, he begged to be allowed to nurse the sick, and threw himself into this work with complete disregard for his own safety, carrying the sick on his own shoulders to the hospital and spending himself without reserve in their service.

He contracted the plague himself and, though he recovered from the acute illness, his health was completely broken. He died on June 21, 1591, at the age of twenty-three, six months before he was to have been ordained to the priesthood. As he lay dying he spoke with great joy of his approaching entrance into heaven. He was beatified by Paul V and canonised in 1726. Pope Benedict XIII proclaimed him patron of Christian youth, a title reaffirmed by Leo XIII. His feast is celebrated on June 21st.