In Chap­ter VI of “For Greater Things: The Sto­ry of Saint Stanis­laus Kost­ka,” the nar­ra­tive shifts to Vien­na, where the young Pol­ish nobles, Paul and Stanis­laus, encounter sig­nif­i­cant changes. Fol­low­ing the death of Emper­or Fer­di­nand I, their Jesuit-run board­ing school is closed due to the new Emper­or Max­i­m­il­ian II reclaim­ing the build­ing. Faced with the need to find new lodg­ing while con­tin­u­ing their edu­ca­tion as day schol­ars, they, under the guid­ance of their tutor Bilin­s­ki, set­tle in the spa­cious res­i­dence of Sen­a­tor Kim­berk­er, a Luther­an, locat­ed in the fash­ion­able Platz Kiemark.

The man­sion, despite its grandeur and the gen­er­ous accom­mo­da­tion offered by Kim­berk­er, brings unfa­mil­iar chal­lenges for Stanis­laus. Notably, his spir­i­tu­al and lifestyle dif­fer­ences soon clash with the more world­ly plea­sures favored by Paul and Bilin­s­ki. The house under Kim­berk­er becomes a live­ly hub for gath­er­ings, often marked by drink­ing and gam­bling, envi­ron­ments from which Stanis­laus with­draws. This with­draw­al is not from dis­dain but from a mis­match of val­ues; while he remains polite and uncom­plain­ing, his soli­tude grows.

Yet, Stanis­laus’s iso­la­tion becomes a fer­tile ground for deep spir­i­tu­al growth. Unlike his broth­er and Bilin­s­ki, whose focus on enter­tain­ment grows in the absence of parental over­sight, Stanis­laus turns inward. His lone­li­ness, rather than becom­ing a source of despair, leads him to seek com­pan­ion­ship in the divine. He con­verts the man­sion’s emp­ty spaces into places of prayer, where he com­mu­ni­cates with God and the saints with the open­ness and sin­cer­i­ty of a return after a long absence.

Through these per­son­al tri­als and the trans­for­ma­tion of phys­i­cal soli­tude into spir­i­tu­al com­pan­ion­ship, Stanis­laus’s char­ac­ter shines. His resilience, cheer­ful­ness, and devout­ness amidst the hedo­nis­tic lifestyle around him under­score his sanc­ti­ty. The chap­ter high­lights the stark dif­fer­ences in cop­ing mech­a­nisms among the youths far from home: while Paul and Bilin­s­ki immerse in tem­po­ral joys, Stanis­laus finds solace and strength in his unwa­ver­ing faith, turn­ing the man­sion into a sanc­tu­ary of qui­et devo­tion and reflec­tion.