An adventure with the Lord

​I was born and grew up in Vietnam during the war. My father died and left six children to the care of my mother when I was one year old. War and poverty made life very difficult for everyone. The suffering of people forced me to reflect on what life was all about. I found the answer in the Good News of Christ, and that made me pursue the priesthood. During my training, the war ended and the communists took over the country. My fellow seminarians and I did our best to finish the training, mostly underground. When I finished my studies, I thought I would be a priest and would serve the people in my country. At that time, the communist government had the final word for any priestly ordination. Every year with permission from my bishop, I sent a request to the government, but the authority kept saying “no” to my ordination without an explanation. Six years later, I planned to escape the country by boat.  

Someone at the coast arranged and prepared for the trip. It was in March 1989. It took me two days on a canoe along the rivers to reach the ocean. I got on a little boat no longer than 20 feet, with 14 other people. They left at midnight without any troubles. Just about eight o’clock in the morning, the government boats appeared from nowhere and the guards began to shoot at our boat. Our boat got hit, but the people were okay, as we would rather have died than to let ourselves fall into the hands of the guards. When the strong wind and big waves approached them, the guards feared for their lives so they stopped chasing them. I continued my journey and realized it was God who protected me and my companions. I crossed the ocean and landed in Malaysia on the seventh day.

I arrived at a refugee camp called Pulau Bidong. There were over 15,000 people in that camp.  Life was not ideal, but safe. It was a matter of time that I would be in a free country. A Canadian delegation came, and thought that I would be a good candidate for Canada. 

February 5, 1990 was the day I put my foot on the free land of Canada, and it was the first time I ever saw and touched snow. I continued to enjoy life and freedom around Toronto and Mississauga. For a while I forgot the reason why I escaped, but God didn’t forget me. My priest friend and the Bishop of Calgary invited me to return to training again. I left everything and took a bus to Calgary. The Bishop sent me to study in Christ the King Seminary in Mission, BC. After a year, I went back to Calgary with distress, as I could not speak the language. I planned to quit, but I met with a missionary priest who worked in Vietnam for 40 years until the communists kicked him out. This changed my life. The priest said, “The war couldn’t kill you, the poverty couldn’t, the communists couldn’t, the ocean couldn’t, and the refugee camp couldn’t, so English, I assure you, cannot kill you either. Be patient if God calls you, he will give you an ability to master the language.”

I then spent the next three years at St. Joseph Seminary in Edmonton and loved following the Lord. It took 26 years between my first day in a seminary and my priestly ordination (1969-1995). I felt like I was a slow learner! But for me, a priest is a man of joy, a man for others, and a man of prayer.  

Yes, dear people of God, have you ever had a thorough reflection on the life of a priest? If you do, or even if you do not, thank God for the priesthood and pray for your priests daily. With such actualities, with such a challenging future, the Eucharist is still a thanksgiving and a source of strength on a priestly journey. I cry out daily with fresh accents as the French priest Jean Baptiste Lacordaire did, “Yes, my God, yes indeed, what a life!”

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Written by Fr. Philip Le

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Fr. Philip Le

Fr. Phililp was born in July 1956 in Hiep Hoa – Long An, Vietnam and came to Canada in_1990.  He was ordained to the priesthood on August 4, 1995 in  Calgary. His first assignment in Calgary was as assistant pastor at St. Mary’s Cathedral (1995-1997). He then moved on to St. Mary’s in Medicine Hat, which was later where he again served as assistant pastor (1997-1999).  Father Le also spent a year in Assumption Catholic Church in Hay River, Mackenzie-Fort Smith in the Northwest Territories (1999-2000). He was also pastor at St. Francis de Sales, in High River (2000 -_2010) and was the administrator of Holy Family in Medicine Hat (2010), where he also became the pastor (2011).  From 2011 to 2018, Fr. Le was at Holy Family, Medicine Hat. He currently serves the parishes of Christ the King, Claresholm, St. Cecilia’s Church, Nanton, and St. Mary’s Church, Champion as pastor.