A Bipulmonary Spiritual Classic
Dom Lorenzo Scupoli, C.R.'s Il combattimento spirituale ( The Spiritual Combat ) is one of the classic works of Catholic spirituality regarding spiritual warfare. The author was a member of the Congregation of Clerks Regular of the Divine Providence, better known as the Theatines, who lived between 1530 and 1610, publishing this work, his most famous, in 1589. For centuries, this work has been an ascetic classic in the Western Church: one great devotee of the work was St. Francis de Sales, a Doctor of the Church, who carried it in his pocket for 20 years. The work's popularity did not stop in the Western Church, though: it migrated to the East, making this classic one revered by both lungs of the Church, West and East. Nicodemus the Hagiorite (Hagiorite means "of the Holy Mountain," that is, Mount Athos in Greece), a Greek Orthodox saint of the 18th century, came across this text and was enamored by it. Seeing its potential for spiritual growth among the Orth...