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Claire Charbonneau |
On December 6, 2008 we learned with great sadness of the passing of Mrs. Claire Charbonneau. Claire was known and respected as one of the pioneers of Christian meditation in Ottawa. She was instrumental in founding one of Ottawa’s first francophone groups.
In the eulogy read at the Funeral Mass on December 13, her daughter Danielle spoke of the importance of meditation in Claire’s life: “Her spiritual life was what she held closest to her heart. My mother had undertaken a long interior journey that led her to the path of meditation. Through meditation a revelation of the Divine unfolded within her. It was because of her continuous, unflagging practice of meditation, renewed day after day, that she came to love her daily life in which she could discern the divine Presence. This Presence was at the very core of her being and her entire spiritual quest was focused on its contemplation.”
Here is an excerpt from the homily given by Father Benoit Garceau, o.m.i, himself a meditator:
“Claire loved the story of the meeting of Jesus and the Samaritan woman at the well. [John 4:5-26]. I think it taught her something precious for her spiritual life: that God is an encounter that happens within. An encounter that is born of a great thirst. The thirst for that water which quenches, not for a moment, but for eternity. A thirst that can only be satisfied by ‘living water’. And this living water is the very water from the Source that sparks within us such a thirst. It is the Divine Presence itself that awakens within us such a deep desire, digs within us such a void, creates within us an opening that only the Infinite can fill. ‘If you would only know the gift of God’, said Jesus to the Samaritan woman. If you would only know that the Source is within yourself, the Source that is the Gift. Deep within ourselves, there is not only the being, but the giving of the Being, the Source that magnetizes all of our desires, that fills us by digging further and makes our thirst not a torture but a reminder of the waters that nourish.
“This gospel narrative showed Claire the road to take in order to live her life more intensely. The path, for lack of a better term, we call ‘the path within’. A path where we are led by a thirst for a Presence which, from the depth of our being, attracts us, a thirst that can only be filled by the opening of our being to that luminous Presence, regardless of the name we give to it, and which reveals itself to us as the ‘Eternal Source of Life’.
“Claire had a great desire to see God. She cultivated that desire over the last ten years through her daily practice of meditation, a practice that was essential to progress on her interior journey. Though meditation helped her to find inner peace, and even new energies indispensable to face life’s daily demands, she meditated first and foremost to give God a chance to be God freely in her life and to dispose herself at the same time to receive from Him the ineffable gift of his love. To open ourselves to this gift is to allow God to fulfill our own creation. God created us in love, for love, so that we may have fullness of life through the act of loving.”
This great love is the legacy Claire left us: “love one another”. We will never forget her love for Jesus, her faithful practice of meditation, her devotion and continuous support to the meditation group at Sacré-Coeur Parish. Claire, we keep you in our hearts – you were a source of inspiration – you touched our lives with your love.
[This is a translation from a French article.]