Fr. Ronald Angervil

“In my distress I called upon the Lord, I cried to my God for help.” Psalm 116:1

I believe that my vocation was born in the midst of a very tragic moment of my life. On April 29, 2005 at 15 years of age, in Port-au-Prince Haiti, the reality of my mom being abducted and held for ransom for three days hit me like a ton of bricks.

Yet, it was in this deep abyss of confusion, despair, and anger that 3 days later while kneeling in a pew at St. Therese of Lisieux Church, seeing my little brother making his first Communion and my mother not being there to see it, that God arose this prayer in my heart. “Lord, your Son Jesus died on a Friday and rose on a Sunday, my mother was taken this past Friday, would you mind returning her this Sunday to us, my younger brothers still need her, but I, in exchange, will give you my life.” I didn’t really know what I was saying, however, I felt a peace and resignation to accept whatever the outcome would be. Thanks be to God she was returned to us.

Then I believe my spiritual journey begun, we left Haiti, we moved to Florida, then from Florida we eventually settled in Welland, Ontario, Canada. Looking back, I believe that God began to prepare me and form me to eventually say yes to His call.

Through my mother and my sister, I learned to pray and find the answers to questions I had about the faith. It came in handy because while in Florida I had a girlfriend who was Pentecostal and challenged my faith at every turn.

When I came to Canada, God would bring a great friend in my life, we would talk about the faith, holiness, lives of the saints, etc. We encouraged each other to go to confession and Adoration often. By the end of high school, the Lord came knocking on the prayer that I made. For a while I resisted, I wanted to marry and have a big family, but it took a while to realize that God’s call was indeed to form a family, but with a different type of fatherhood. All of this was confirmed when I visited the seminary of St. Philip Neri in Toronto. For some reason I knew that I needed to be there. The rest of the journey wasn’t without its challenges, but I had learned by then to turn to the Lord and let Him guide me.