De ardenti amore, et desiderio vehementi suscipiendi Christum.

A Burning Desire to Receive Christ

The soul ardently longs to receive Christ in Communion with the same burning devotion shown by the saints.

With the deepest devotion and a burning love, with my whole heart and all its fervor, I long to receive you, Lord — just as many saints and devout souls longed for you in receiving Communion, those who were most pleasing to you in the holiness of their lives and who were aflame with the most ardent devotion.¹ O my God, eternal love, my whole good, boundless happiness — I want to receive you with the most intense longing and the most worthy reverence that any saint ever felt or could feel.²

Total Self-Offering and Marian Reception

The devotee offers the whole heart to God, holding nothing back, and asks to receive Christ as the Virgin Mary did at the Annunciation.

And although I am unworthy to have all those feelings of devotion, nevertheless I offer you the whole affection of my heart, as if I alone possessed all those most ardently inflamed desires.³⁴ But whatever a devout mind can conceive and desire, all these things I offer and present to you with the deepest reverence and the most inward fervor.⁵⁶ I don't want to hold anything back for myself, but to sacrifice myself and all that's mine to you willingly and most gladly.⁷ Lord my God, my Creator and my Redeemer, grant that I may receive you today with such gratitude, dignity, and love, with such hope, faith, and purity of heart, just as your most holy Mother, the glorious Virgin Mary, received and desired you — when she humbly and devoutly answered the angel announcing the mystery of your incarnation: "Behold the handmaid of the Lord, let it be done to me according to your word."^✦⁸⁹¹⁰

John the Baptist’s Joy and the Soul’s Holy Longing

John the Baptist’s joyful leaping in the womb and his witness to the Bridegroom inspire the soul to present itself aflame with devotion, joined to all creation’s praise.

And just as your most excellent forerunner among the saints, blessed John the Baptist, rejoicing in your presence, exulted in the joy of the Holy Spirit while he was still enclosed in his mother's womb.^✦ And afterwards, seeing Jesus walking among men, greatly humbling himself, he said with devout affection: <quote>The friend of the bridegroom, who stands and hears him, rejoices with joy because of the bridegroom's voice</quote>. So too I, with great and sacred desires, long to be set ablaze and to present myself to you with my whole heart.^✦¹¹ And so I offer and present to you the jubilations of all devout hearts, their burning affections, their mental ecstasies, and their heavenly illuminations and celestial visions, together with all the virtues and praises celebrated and to be celebrated by every creature in heaven and on earth — for me and for all those commended to me in prayer — so that by all you may be worthily praised and glorified forever.¹²

Vows of Praise and Communal Intercession

The soul offers God the infinite praise He is owed and invites all the heavenly spirits and the faithful to join in continual thanksgiving.

Receive my vows, Lord my God, and the desires of infinite praise and immense blessing that are owed to you by right, according to the abundance of your ineffable greatness.¹³ These things I render to you, and I desire to render them through each individual day and moment of time; and to render thanks and praises together with you, I invite and beseech all the heavenly spirits and all your faithful ones, with their prayers and devotions.¹⁴

Universal Praise and Prayer for the Sinner

All peoples are called to magnify God’s name, while the devotee asks that all who receive the Sacrament worthily may obtain grace and remember him in prayer.

Let all peoples, tribes, and tongues praise you, and magnify your holy and sweet name with the deepest devotion and burning jubilation.^✦^✦ And all who reverently and devoutly celebrate your most high Sacrament and receive it with full faith may they deserve to find grace and mercy with you, and may they humbly entreat you on behalf of me, a sinner.^✦ And when they have gained the longed-for devotion and joyful communion, and have been well comforted and wonderfully refreshed from the sacred, heavenly table, may they deign to remember me, poor as I am.^✦^✦¹⁵

Read the original Latin

Cum summa devotione et ardenti amore cum toto cordis affectu et fervore desidero te, Domine: quemadmodum multi Sancti et devotæ personæ in communicando et desideraverunt, qui tibi maxime in sanctitate vitæ placuerunt, et in ardentissima devotione fuerunt. O Deus meus, amor æternus, totum bonum meum, felicitas interminabilis: cupio te suscipere cum vehementissimo desiderio et dignissima reverentia, quam aliquis Sanctorum unquam habuit et sentire potuit.

Et licet indignus sum omnia illa sentimenta devotionis habere, tamen offero tibi totum cordis mei affectum, ac si omnia illa gratissime inflammata desideria solus haberem. Sed et quæcumque potest pia mens concipere et desiderare, hæc omnia tibi cum summa veneratione et intimo servore præbeo et offero. Nihil opto reservare mihi, sed me et omnia mea tibi sponte et libentissime immolare. Domine Deus meus, creator meus et redemtor meus, cum tali gratitudine, dignitate et amore, cum tali spe, fide, et puritate affecto te hodie suscipere, sicut te suscepit et desideravit sanctissima Mater tua, gloriosa Virgo Maria, quando Angelo evangelizanti sibi incarnationis tuæ mysterium humiliter et devote respondit: Ecce ancilla Domini, fiat mihi secundum verbum tuum.

Et sicut beatus Præcursor tuus excellentissimus Sanctorum, Johannes Baptista, in præsentia tua lætabundus exultavit in gaudio Spiritus Sancti, dum adhuc maternis clauderetur visceribus. Et postmodum cernens inter homines Jesum ambulantem, valde se humilians, devoto cum affectu dicebat: Amicus autem sponsi, qui stat et audit cum gaudio, gaudet propter vocem sponsi: sic et ego magnis et sacris desideriis opto inflammari, et tibi ex toto corde me ipsum præsentare. Unde et omnium devotorum cordium jubilationes, ardentes affectus, mentales excessus, ac supernales illuminationes et cælicas visiones tibi offero et exhibeo cum omnibus virtutibus et laudibus, ab omni creatura in cælo et in terra celebratis et celebrandis, pro me et omnibus mihi in oratione commendatis, quatenus ab omnibus digne lauderis, et in perpetuum glorificeris.

Accipe vota mea, Domine Deus meus, et desideria infinitæ laudationis et immensæ benedictionis, quæ tibi secundum multitudinem ineffabilis magnitudinis tuæ jure debentur. Hæc tibi reddo et reddere desidero per singulos dies et momenta temporum, atque ad reddendum mecum tibi gratias et laudes, omnes cælestes spiritus et cunctos fideles tuos precibus et affectibus invito et exoro.

Laudent te universi populi, tribus, et linguæ, et sanctum et mellifluum nomen tuum cum summa devotione et ardenti jubilatione magnificent. Et quicumque reverenter ac devote altissimum Sacramentum tuum celebrant et plena fide recipiunt, gratiam et misericordiam apud te invenire mereantur, et pro me peccatore suppliciter exorent. Cumque optata devotione ac fruibili unione potiti fuerint, et bene consolati, ac mirifice refecti de sacra mensa cælesti abscesserint, mei pauperis recordari dignentur.

Scripture echoes

↩Luke.1.38 — And Mary said, 'Behold, the servant of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word.' And the angel departed from her.
↩Luke.1.41 — And it came to pass, when Elizabeth heard the greeting of Mary, the baby leaped in her womb; and Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit.
↩John.3.29 — The one who has the bride is the bridegroom. But the friend of the bridegroom, who stands and hears him, rejoices greatly because of the bridegroom's voice. So this joy of mine is now complete.
↩Ps.117.1 — Praise the LORD, all you nations; extol him, all you peoples.
↩Rev.7.9 — After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands.
↩Heb.4.16 — Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.
↩Ps.23.5 — You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies; you anoint my head with oil; my cup overflows.
↩Luke.16.21 — and longing to be fed from what fell from the rich man's table; but even the dogs came and kept licking his sores.

Notes

1 ↩communicando rendered as 'receiving Communion' to preserve Eucharistic specificity per Book 4 sacramental register.
2 ↩desiderio rendered as 'longing' to capture devotional yearning; reverentia kept as 'reverence' for Eucharistic preparation context.
3 ↩affectum rendered 'affection' per approved lexicon (affectio → affection in prayerful positive contexts).
4 ↩sentimenta is post-classical (classical sententia); rendered 'feelings' to capture the interior-devotional sense Thomas intends.
5 ↩pia mens rendered 'devout mind' to capture the interior-devotional quality of pius in Thomas's usage.
6 ↩servor (post-classical, ablative) rendered 'fervor' to convey the burning interior zeal Thomas intends.
7 ↩immolare rendered 'sacrifice' in its full Eucharistic and sacrificial sense, fitting the Book 4 sacramental context.
8 ↩affecto (ablative of description) rendered 'of heart' to convey the interior disposition modifying the implied subject.
9 ↩Quoted span: Luke 1:38 (Vulgate). 'Ecce ancilla Domini, fiat mihi secundum verbum tuum.' Candidate scripture allusion flagged for tx-08 Moses resolution.
10 ↩puritate rendered 'purity' with 'of heart' supplied from affecto to capture the combined interior quality Thomas intends.
11 ↩The italicized span echoes John 3:29 (Vulgate): 'Amicus autem sponsi, qui stat et audit eum, gaudio gaudet propter vocem sponsi.' Final resolution deferred to Moses stage.
12 ↩The phrase 'mental ecstasies' (mentales excessus) refers to states of spiritual rapture or transport of mind, not psychological disorder.
13 ↩vota rendered as vows (prayers/devotional offerings); desideria as desires (devotional longing); jure debentur as are owed to you by right — the Latin carries a sense of what is justly due to God's majesty.
14 ↩reddo rendered as render (give back, offer in return); affectibus as devotions (in the sense of heartfelt affections directed toward God); invito et exoro as I invite and I beseech — two distinct verbs of earnest appeal.
15 ↩fruibilis here carries the sense of 'enjoyable/fruitive' — the soul's glad participation in union with Christ through the Sacrament. The rendering 'joyful communion' captures both the delight and the participatory union intended.