Praise be Jesus and Mary, now and forever.
Saint Aloysius Gonzaga was born on March 9th, 1568, in his family's castle at Castiglione.
Seven siblings would follow him, and while his mother taught him to pray and do works of charity, his father prepared him for the duties of his rank.
These included war.
At one point, a force of 3,000 soldiers was training in preparation for an expedition, so his father brought his son to the camp, even though he was only six.
He dressed little Aloysius in armor, had him march around with a little pike, and gave him a toy gun.
This toy gun was loaded with real gunpowder and fired real projectiles.
The only thing that made it a toy was its size.
One day he loaded it in an unsafe way, and the powder blew up in his face, but Providence was watching over him, so the only harm he suffered was superficial burns to his face.
After that, he wasn't allowed to carry powder anymore.
One afternoon when the soldiers were taking a siesta and were resting in the afternoon, a cannon shot rang out in the camp.
Worried soldiers came running.
What is it?
A traitor?
A mutiny?
But when they arrived, they only found little Aloysius, unconscious because the cannon he'd fired had recoiled on its wheels straight into his chest.
Once again, he suffered no real harm.
He'd stolen some powder and loaded the cannon to prove he could handle gunpowder.
The soldiers were so impressed with a boy who could fire a cannon that they talked his father out of punishing him.
Aloysius, for his part, was later ashamed of himself for having sinned by stealing.
His conversion was completed soon afterwards when he turned seven.
From that time, he steadfastly avoided sin and dedicated himself to prayer.
Every day he prayed the Office of Our Lady, the Seven Penitential Psalms, and other prayers.
According to St. Robert Bellarmine and three other priests who were his confessors, St.
Aloysius never committed a mortal sin in all his life.
When he was eight, his father sent him and his brother Rudolf to be pages in the Medici court in Florence.
He found the court disappointingly vain, but progressing nevertheless in the spiritual life, his love of the Blessed Virgin led him to make a vow of virginity.
After two years, when he was not yet ten, his father was made governor of Monferrato, and he called his son to live with him at the court of Mantua.
The duke was their relative.
There he made up his mind to become a priest.
He would let his eldest brother be the Marquis of Castiglione instead.
Because he was ill, was sickly, when winter was past, the Marquis sent him back to Castiglione, hoping that his native air would do him good.
St. Charles Borromeo was traveling around visiting the diocese as requested by the Pope and came through Castiglione, and the two spoke at great length.
St. Charles was impressed with the twelve-year-old boy's holiness, and since he hadn't made his first communion, he got permission to give it to him.
St. Aloysius was delighted to finally have someone to whom he could open the secrets of his soul and receive guidance on the spiritual life.
Later after escaping death, when his carriage broke in half while crossing a stream, he decided to become a religious, but he told his father nothing of this at the time.
The next year, 1581, Maria of Austria traveled to Madrid accompanied by Italian nobles, including the Marquis and his family.
He was in Spain a few years, and while he was there he decided to become a Jesuit and finally told his father of his decision.
His father was furious.
His son already had a vocation as a Marquis, and he did not need another one.
His mother, on the other hand, was pleased.
She had prayed before his birth to have a son wholly consecrated to the Lord's service.
The Marquis sent his son touring to distract him from this crazy idea of becoming a Jesuit, but he was not distracted, and eventually, the Marquis gave in.
In 1585 Aloysius was able to enter the Jesuits and renounced his inheritance, the Marquis, in favor of his eldest sibling.
Perhaps you can get some idea of the dangers from which Saint Aloysius was preserved by God's grace and his own determination to have sin if we jump forward in time to see what became of his brother.
Aloysius's father died the year after Aloysius entered the Jesuits, and Rudolf became the Marquis of Castiglione.
When one of his uncles died three years later he hoped to inherit that territory too, but instead, it passed to another uncle who had no sons but tried to arrange things to leave the fief to whoever would marry his daughter.
Rudolf made sure that he would inherit it by having his uncle assassinated before he could complete those arrangements.
Then he went with a company of soldiers to take possession of the property, but he was so tyrannical that less than a year after he occupied the town, someone shot him dead.
His mother had his body transported back to Castiglione and buried in the family chapel, but less than a month later, it had to be disinterred because the month before Rudolf was killed, he had been excommunicated by the Pope for forging papal coinage, so he couldn't be buried in holy ground.
Several years later, another Pope lifted the excommunication, and Rudolf's remains could finally return to the chapel.
So here we have two brothers, each determined to get what he wants at all costs.
One, by the grace of God, maintained his baptismal innocence and died a saint, while the other was overcome by greed and was murdered as he had murdered.
Returning to Saint Aloysius's life as a Jesuit, he was exemplary, though his piety seemed excessive to some.
In January 1591, the plague struck Rome and became intense in April and May.
The Jesuits set up a hospital in which they served the sick.
It was dangerous work, and several priests died martyrs of charity.
Saint Aloysius volunteered to work in the hospital and also went out into the streets to find sick people who needed to be carried to the hospital because they couldn't walk anymore.
From one of these, he caught the plague, and after speaking with Saint Robert Billerman about the happiness of speedily going to God, he was wrapped in ecstasy.
In it, he learned that he would die on the active day of Corpus Christi, and when he returned to his senses he said the Te Deum to thank God that death and heaven were so near.
He died rather suddenly in the first hour of the appointed day, June 21st, 1591.
He was only 23 years old and had been with the Jesuits less than six years, but that was enough time for him to become a saint.
Praise be Jesus and Mary, now and forever.

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