How do you destroy the curse of scrupulosity? Start with these five simple remedies from Fr William Doyle SJ.
Editor’s Notes
This is the second part of a serialisation of Fr William Doyle SJ’s guide for dealing with scrupulosity.
It sets out five remedies for scruples which cannot be omitted by anyone who wants to overcome this problem.
For more on Fr Doyle and this pamphlet, see Part I. (We have also expanded the commentary on the scurrilous attempt to link “sedevacantism” with scrupulosity, recently published in Eric Sammons’s Crisis Magazine. Go and check it out!)
Scruples and their Treatment
Fr William Doyle
Treatment of Scrupulosity
The general rules for the treatment of scruples may be reduced to five: prayer, vigilance, struggle against depression, obedience, generosity in self-conquest. On the first three, little need be said; obedience and generosity in self-conquest constitute the basis of the treatment.
First Remedy: Prayer
The precept laid down by our Lord Jesus Christ to pray in temptation is evidently applicable to scruples, which are a great danger even to salvation. Satan would mock at our weakness in our fight with scruples, as Goliath mocked at David, unless we were armed by prayer with the very strength of God.
And so prayer, however dry and against the grain, is needed by the soul that is a prey to scruples.
Second Remedy: Vigilance
“Watch ye and pray that ye enter not into temptation” (Matt. 26:41).
For a scrupulous soul, what is this holy vigilance recommended by Christ? It is the vigilance of a soldier facing an enemy. To sleep, to throw down one’s arms, to neglect precautions, would be serious faults against this warlike vigilance prescribed by our Saviour. How foolish, then, those who think to cure scrupulous souls by recommending them to have a good time of it, to put aside prayer, mortification of the senses, and all care of conscience! Do they consider themselves wiser than Jesus Christ who thus dare to counsel the very opposite to His command?
Third Remedy: Struggle against Depression
If there be anyone who feels the effects of sadness as described by the Wise Man: “The sadness of a man consumes the heart” (Prov. 25:20), it is the poor scrupulous soul. And sadness only increases scrupulosity.
The scrupulous, therefore, will do well to have recourse with moderation to innocent amusements. And try to occupy their mind with pleasant thoughts. Above all, such people should strive to keep themselves usefully employed. This is the best antidote to trouble of mind. Does not a trouble, of which we think ten times less, owing to our occupations, become in consequence ten times lighter? No one can pity those who brood over their worries, neglecting the duties of their state, which, whilst giving them necessary distraction, would sanctify their lives and save them much suffering.
Fourth Remedy: Obedience
The two general remedies that yet remain to be discussed, obedience and generosity in self-conquest, are by far the most important. Without perfect, trustful and blind obedience to an experienced confessor there can be no cure for scrupulosity. This obedience should consist of two things: obedience of action, which carries out exactly all that the director prescribes; and obedience of the intelligence, which believes all that is ordered to be believed.
Obedience of action has for its object the putting into practice the freedom of conscience ordered by the director. To ensure complete cure, this freedom must be fully practised, the least holding back would spoil much, if not everything, since by so acting the scrupulous person would show that he either forgets, or does not believe, that it is God Whom he obeys. Although obedience to one’s confessor is necessary for all, it is more indispensable for the scrupulous than for any other.
There are several reasons for this.
First of all, because scrupulosity, by affecting the head, takes away one’s common sense in matters of conscience. Providence gave the soul common sense as a guide, and now that this is lost, a substitute is sent in the person of the director, a sympathetic and blessed guide, clothed with divine authority, having received a heavenly commission by the words: “He that hears you, hears Me” (Luke 10:16).
Not only does scrupulosity deprive man of the enlightened guide given him by his Creator, but at every step it leads him astray in a labyrinth of doubt.
For this reason also obedience is an indispensable guide. For what else can rescue him from this dreadful confusion? Again, when a plant is bent to the ground by the wind, a prop is necessary in order to strengthen it little by little until it is strong enough to withstand the storm. This is the part of a wise director. Not only does he help the soul in every storm, but he teaches it little by little to do without his aid, a result, however, that will be obtained only by an entire and courageous obedience.
But obedience of action must be accompanied and elevated by obedience of the understanding. For of what value, before God, is the servile obedience of the body, if the soul remains in revolt and persists in opposing its own false ideas to those of truth itself? Towards this more noble obedience the efforts of all enlightened directors tend.
In the malady of scruples, the demon, by insinuating wrong ideas, leads his unfortunate victim where he wills. Therefore these ideas must be rectified. They have gradually, under Satan’s influence, passed from being mere wrong ideas, through the stage of wrong impressions, on to that of unshaken convictions, and finally have become rules of conduct, over which obedience alone can have any power. It is these errors of the intellect which keep the poor soul away from the Sacraments, and cause it to be guilty of foolish extravagances. But what, it may be asked, are these wrong ideas? The answer can be given in a word: all those by the confessor so considered. Those most generally met with are:
“My confessions were bad. My confessor does not understand me, he is mistaken in me, not believing that I could be so wicked. I have never had contrition. I am constantly committing sins against faith, against purity. I blaspheme interiorly. I rash judge, even priests. The oftener I receive Holy Communion, the worse I become,” etc. etc.
Wrong ideas like these must be given no quarter. It is God Who commands them to be exterminated without mercy, as of old He commanded Saul to destroy the Amalecites, not even sparing Agag, the king. That is to say, the scrupulous soul must abandon any opinion contrary to that of the director. But once rejected, are such opinions done with? By no means.
The Amalecites may feign death, and a guard must be set over apparently dead bodies that may seek to rise again. Above all, there must be a watch for traitors, who may have escaped the carnage, and remain closely concealed in some fold of the obstinate understanding. How may these be discovered? A little watchfulness suffices to detect them. Their presence betrays itself by an equivocation, by an embarrassed silence, or by a want of progress. To the question: “Do you still believe in such or such a theological truth, in such or such a way of looking at your conscience, upon which we were agreed some time ago?” a negative or hesitating answer will be given, or they will say “I dare not act on it.” Is not the clinging to one’s own opinion at once revealed? Are not the Amalecites discovered?
To sum up this twofold obedience, which is the fourth general remedy of scrupulosity, the scrupulous soul must give the confessor unlimited obedience by believing in, as well as acting on, his decisions and directions. Like St. Peter, this soul has the happiness of listening to Jesus Christ Himself. He is sure that it is really Our Lord Who commands him to walk boldly on the waters by despising foolish fears. Ought he not then to obey the call by casting himself into the sea as the intrepid Apostle did?
Fifth Remedy: Generosity in Self-conquest
Self-conquest consists in persevering acts of self-denial.
Vain fears, silly imaginations, all the turmoil and confusion that uncontrolled scrupulosity engenders in the soul, must be resolutely met and opposed at every step. This victory over foolish impressions is also the victory over scrupulosity. But this victory costs much to cowardly and sensual souls; indeed, at first it seems to them impossible.
On the other hand, it is easy to souls accustomed to self-denial. St. Aloysius Gonzaga was a striking example of this. Although his conscience was so delicate that he was unusually exposed to the danger of scrupulosity, his heroic mortification had become so habitual and rendered him so docile to his director, that once a thing was shown to be a scruple, it was conquered on the spot. Less heroic and mortified souls will, of course, have greater difficulty in winning a victory.
Yet let them not despair. The mountain of difficulties will disappear before perseverance. It is in the nature of impressions to become less vivid, to weaken, when despised, and perseverance in generously ignoring them, and driving them away will make them, in a little time, vanish completely.
Scruples and their Treatment – Fr William Doyle
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Which congregation of priests in 2026 would you trust to not lead a scrupulous soul into laxity or modernism or worse scruples?