Dear Gonzo,<\/p>\n
I\u2019m sorry to hear that you\u2019re already bored.\u00a0 It surprises me a little bit, since you tend to be so active and creative.\u00a0 I imagine there\u2019s a little bit of subtle rebellion at work inside your boredom \u2013 since you didn\u2019t get the summer you were hoping for, your vanity is pouting a bit.\u00a0 Shake yourself out of it, my bright young nephew, before the devil starts putting you under his spell.\u00a0 I think a refreshing look at your patron saint may help.<\/p>\n
St Aloysius died at the young age of 23.\u00a0 He was in formation to be a Jesuit priest at the time, but God was in a rush to get him home.\u00a0 During his few years of preparation for the priesthood, Aloysius filled the seminary with a joy and energy that inspired his confreres to become the spiritual workhorses of 17th<\/sup> century Europe.\u00a0 He achieved his intense and contagious love for God and for all of God\u2019s creatures by following one simple rule: seeking first the Kingdom of Christ.<\/p>\n His mother was the empress\u2019s lady of honor, and his father was a northern Italian duke who had great ambitions for this, his oldest son (ambitions that did not include a vocation to the priesthood).\u00a0 Consequently, he and his younger brother spent their youth bouncing from royal court to royal court, receiving a superlative education (in the age of the great \u201crenaissance men\u201d) and enjoying the innumerable pleasures of nobility.<\/p>\n But Aloysius had early on felt a deep desire to put his life fully at the service of God, and through all the fancies of high privilege he faithfully upheld his rigorous prayer commitments and valiantly guarded his Christian virtue.\u00a0 It served him well.\u00a0 When his father finally permitted him to enter the seminary (after exhausting an entire arsenal of crafty dissuasion attempts, like sending him on a tour of the aristocratic courts of northern Italy, engaging powerful Dukes and nobles to \u201ctalk sense\u201d to him, giving him a series of cushy, flashy commissions that might stir up worldly ambition, and even convincing Church prelates to try and talk him out of his vocation), not only was Aloysius already on the path to profound union with God, but his dad was so impressed that he too reformed his vice-ridden life before dying two months later.<\/p>\n Before he was able to join the seminary, even while he was little more than a boy, Aloysius would spend his summers organizing catechism classes and other healthy activities for the boys in and around whatever town or palace where he happened to be lodging.\u00a0 This generosity, concern for others, and eager desire to spread Christ\u2019s Kingdom was both the cause and the result of keeping Christ foremost in his heart and his mind: he always sought the Kingdom first.\u00a0 And when you do that, there\u2019s always much more work to be done than time to do it in.\u00a0 The only thing you can\u2019t find time for is being bored.<\/p>\n So, even though you didn\u2019t get the summer job you most wanted, and even though your parents wouldn\u2019t let you take that boat trip around the world (I can\u2019t blame them), please don\u2019t think your summer has to end up being a waste or a bore.\u00a0 If it is, you\u2019ll have only yourself to blame.<\/p>\n Your loving uncle,<\/p>\n Eddy<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Dear Gonzo, I\u2019m sorry to hear that you\u2019re already bored.\u00a0 It surprises me a little bit, since you tend to be so active and creative.\u00a0 I imagine there\u2019s a little 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