Born on June 6, 1928, in the city of St-Zacharie (Quebec), Emilien discovers his call to religious life very early in age, as he listens to the sermons of Fr Saint-Georges Groleau, who was a missionary in Japan. In 1940 his family, as many other families of this community, moves out to Abitibi, in Rapide-Danseur. The young Emilien enters then the Apostolic School of Beauport, run by the Missionaries of the Sacred Heart. His brother was already a member of this community. He makes his religious profession on September 8, 1949, and is ordained a priest on June 24, 1955.
After his ordination he asks to be sent to the Dominican Republic, where he becomes one of the founders of the Missionary Seminary of San Jose de Las Matas. He founds and directs the journal “Amigo del Hogar”. He becomes superior of his community in the Dominican Republic from 1966 to 1973 and in 1971 the Provincial of the Missionaries of the Sacred-Heart. He takes part in several projects, such as a vocational center, a seminary, several chapels, centers for human advancement, catechesis and the Curcillos movement.
In 1973 he falls ill with tuberculosis and has to return to Canada for treatment and rest. He is healed miraculously by some lay people from a charismatic prayer group, who happened to be visiting the hospital and who pray over him. Since then he becomes involved in the CCR. He participates in prayer groups and discovers he has been given a powerful gift of healing by God. He returns to the Dominican Republic and founds a group of prayer that grows from 200 to 4000 people. From 1974 to 1985 Fr Emilien visits parishes in the Dominican Republic and all over the world, giving charismatic retreats. He will visit 72 different countries. On November 28, 1982, he founds “les Serviteurs du Christ Vivant”, a community of lay people. In 1985 he is freed from all other responsibilities in his community so that he may devote himself entirely to teaching and to his healing ministry. He dies on June 8, 1999, from heart complications in San Antonio de Arredondo, Cordoba (Argentina), where he was preaching a retreat.
