St. Aloysius Gonzaga
(1568-1591)
Feast day: June
21
The people who mass-produce statues and holy cards
have done St. Aloysius Gonzaga no favors. The standard image
of the saint as a frail, doe-eyed novice has given us the
wrong impression. It may even be responsible for the decline
in devotion to St. Aloysius. Yet Aloysius deserves a revival,
especially as the patron saint of teenagers.
The time and
place where he grew up — 16th-century Italy — is not very
different from 21st century America. It was a lax, morally
careless, self-indulgent age. Aloysius saw the decadence
around him and vowed not to be part of it. He did not,
however, become a kill-joy. Like any teenage boy, he wanted
to have a good time, and as a member of an aristocratic
family he had plenty of opportunities for amusement. He
enjoyed horse races, banquets and the elaborate parties held
in palace gardens.
But if Aloysius found himself at a social
function that took a turn to the lascivious, he left.
Aloysius did not just want to be good, he wanted to be holy;
and on this point he could be tough and uncompromising. He
came by these qualities naturally: among the great families
of Renaissance Italy, the Medici were famous as patrons of
the arts, and the Borgias as schemers, but the Gonzagas were
a warrior clan. While most Gonzaga men aspired to conquer
others, Aloysius was determined to conquer himself. Aloysius
wanted to be a priest. When he was 12 or 13, he invented for
himself a program he thought would prepare him for the
religious life. He climbed out of bed in the middle of the
night to put in extra hours kneeling on the cold stone floor
of his room. Occasionally, he even beat himself with a
leather dog leash.
Aloysius was trying to become a saint by
sheer willpower. It was not until he entered the Jesuit
novitiate in Rome that he had a spiritual director — St.
Robert Bellarmine — to guide him. Bellarmine put a stop to
Aloysius' boot camp approach to sanctity, commanding him to
follow the Jesuit rule of regular hours of prayer and simple
acts of self-control and self-denial. Aloysius thought the
Jesuits were too lenient, but he obeyed. Such over-the-top
zeal may have exasperated Bellarmine, but he believed that
Aloysius' fervor was genuine and that with proper guidance
the boy might be a saint.
To his credit, Aloysius recognized
that his bullheadedness was a problem. From the novitiate he
wrote to his brother, "I am a piece of twisted iron. I
entered the religious life to get twisted straight."
Then, in
January 1591, the plague struck Rome. With the city's
hospitals overflowing with the sick and the dying, the
Jesuits sent every priest and novice to work in the wards.
This was a difficult assignment for the squeamish Aloysius.
Once he started working with the sick, however, fear and
disgust gave way to compassion. He went into the streets of
Rome and carried the ill and the dying to the hospital on his
back. There he washed them, found them a bed, or at least a
pallet, and fed them.
Such close contact with the sick was
risky. Within a few weeks, Aloysius contracted the plague
himself and died. He was 23 years old.
In the sick, the
helpless, the dying, St. Aloysius saw the crucified Christ.
The man of the iron will who thought he could take Heaven by
sheer determination surrendered at last to divine grace.
Craughwell is the author of Saints for Every Occasion
(Stampley Enterprises, 2001).
Copyright 2004 Arlington Catholic Herald. All rights
reserved.