GENTILINI, GIOVANNI BATTISTA. - Jesuit, controversialist, b. at Vesio di Tremosine (Brescia) on 26 Nov. 1745, d. at Rome on 16 Dec. 1816, while he was preaching the scriptural lectures at the Gesù. Having entered the Society of Jesus in 1765, he was soon overtaken by the suppression of the Order (1773) and remained in the diocese of Brescia, first serving as parish priest at Portese, then as archpriest and rural vicar at Lonato. When the Society was re-established (1814), he rejoined his brethren and was appointed superior at Naples.
He took a very active part in all the religious controversies of his time, defending sound doctrine and refuting the errors then in vogue, especially concerning the civic oath (against Fr. G. V. BOLSENA), the sale and purchase of ecclesiastical property confiscated by the Cisalpine Republic, the value of attrition, and the limits of civil authority in matrimonial cases.
Principal works: Confutazione della lettera di un cittadino prete riguardante le cause matrimoniali (Mantua, 1797); Riflessioni teologiche intorno al giuramento civico contro il parere di un teologo romano e sopra la vendita dei beni ecclesiastici (Verona, 1798); La pazzia di chi difende il giuramento civico (Brescia, 1799); All'anonimo autore del libro del diritto della civile sovranità sopra il matrimonio (Verona, 1798); Sopra il valore dell'attrizione e la virtù della carità (Brescia, 1802); La devozione al S. Cuore di Gesù (Verona, 1803).