TAN – The Spiritual Combat

Salvation and spiritual perfection should not be sought haphazardly; a strategy is needed to win the battle for our souls.

The Spiritual Combat, first published in 1589, provides timeless guidance in spiritual discipline. St. Francis de Sales (1576-1622) read from it himself every day and recommended it to everyone under his direction.

Vigorous, realistic and full of keen insight into human nature, The Spiritual Combat consists of short chapters based on the maxim that in the spiritual life one must either "fight or die". Fr. Scupoli shows the Christian how to combat his passions and vices, especially impurity and sloth, in order to arrive at victory.

Dom Lorenzo Scupoli was born in Otranto, Italy in 1530 and died in Naples in 1610. Nothing is known about his early life. At about the age of 40, he entered the Theatines and made his novitiate under St. Andrew Avellino. He was ordained in 1577. It is said that he met St. Francis de Sales in Padua between 1589 and 1591 and gave him a copy of The Spiritual Combat. For some reason that has never been revealed, he was laicized in 1585 and lived in retirement in Theatine houses until his death. Some sources say that his name was cleared at the end of his life, though he offered no defense of himself. The first edition of The Spiritual Combat bearing Scupoli's name was published in the year of his death 1610.