Jan Berchmans was the eldest son of a Diest shoemaker, educated by the Jesuits at Mechelen, and entered the Society of Jesus in 1616 at seventeen. He took his first vows in 1618 and was sent to the Roman College for the standard course of philosophy and theology in 1619, walking the full distance from Antwerp to Rome on foot with one companion.
His Roman life was outwardly unremarkable — typical scholastic schedule of classes, choir, common life. His spiritual director Bartolomeo Ricci and his fellow scholastics noted only his perfect observance of the rule (his motto, recorded by Ricci, was 'My penance is to live the common life perfectly'), his extraordinary calm under provocation, and the depth of his interior devotion to the Eucharist and the Immaculate Conception.
He fell ill in August 1621 after representing the Roman College in a public theological debate at the Greek College. He died at the Roman College on August 13, 1621, aged twenty-two, having been a Jesuit for five years. Canonized 1888, traditionally grouped with Stanislaus Kostka (1568) and Aloysius Gonzaga (1591) as the three young Jesuit patrons of Catholic youth.