Chapter 85: A Prayer of thanksgiving to Christ for His Incarnation, Passion, Resurrection, Ascension, and Mission of the Holy Ghost with a fuller bestowal of gifts

O MOST sweet Lord Jesus Christ, Who desire my everlasting Salvation, I, a man poor and weak, and undeserving of any comfort or any good thing, would bless You; and, together with Your Saints and Your Elect, would glorify for ever Your most Holy Name.

Chiefly do I thank You for having, of Your great love and pity, willed to become man for me, to take my nature upon You, outside the course of nature to be conceived by the Holy Ghost, and to be miraculously born of Mary, a pure Virgin; to be suckled and nourished; to be circumcised; and to be presented in the Temple, in order that You might cleanse me from every impurity of mind and body, and might teach me to live soberly, righteously and chastely all my days.

Still more, and every day and hour of my life, do I thank You for Your most holy and most bitter Passion; for it was for me that You did vouchsafe to suffer, to be crucified, to die and to be buried, in order that by Your sinless Death You might deliver me from everlasting death, and might by Your example strengthen me to be patient under adversity.

Further, with a heart full of joy, do I thank You for having, for my consolation, risen on the third day from the Tomb, and given great joy to Your disciples by appearing to them in the Upper Room when the doors were shut; doing this that I may not despair in any tribulation of my own, or when any harm or danger befalls me, but may trust in You for deliverance from my present trouble, and may have a sure hope of being at the last day raised by You, together with Your elect, to everlasting life.

Yet again do I most devoutly thank You, rejoicing with them, not only with my lips, but from the bottom of my heart, for that august procession of Yours to Bethania, and for Your glorious Ascension into Heaven, in the presence of Your holy Mother, and of others Your disciples. You did go before to prepare for me a place with You; and to open to me by Your Passion and Your Cross the gate of the Kingdom of Heaven, where with the Angels You now live and reign in the everlasting glory of Your Father, until such time as You shall return at the end of the world to judge both the living and the dead. This it was which was taught us by the two holy Angels clothed in white garments (a symbol of the joy of this sacred Feast) who at that time appeared to Your disciples, as they were looking up after You to heaven. Oh how blessed were the eyes which were found worthy to behold You in the Flesh; and how blessed were the ears which heard You speaking of the Kingdom of God, than which nothing can be found more delightful to hear about, nothing more blessed to enjoy!

It was for me that You did ascend into the highest Heavens, above the Angels in their serried ranks, to that place where dwell those blessed ones who even now reign with You in Your excellent Glory. You did thither ascend, in order that all my hope might be set on things above, and might be lifted up to You, instead of being fixed on things earthly, and seeking its delight in them. Apart from God there is nothing which is not empty and transient, worthless and of no account. Everything which keeps me back from God, and stands in the way of devout prayer and meditation upon heavenly things, is to be spurned and put aside.

I beseech You, therefore, O most loving Jesus, King of everlasting glory, that in the Kingdom of Your Father You would remember me, the least of all Your servants, and would send to me now from Heaven the Holy Ghost the Paraclete, to be my true Comforter, and to give me renewed zeal and a larger outpouring of spiritual gifts. Amen.