The Road and the Silence

In September 2018, Father R al Ouellette locked the door of his rectory in Fort-Coulonge, Quebec, and drove west. He thought he was exhausted. He thought a month on the road would restore him.

From the cliffs of Northern Ontario to the Pacific's edge, from Walmart parking lots to remote parishes, this is the story of one priest's attempt to cross a country - and himself - while carrying a weight he could not yet name.

Six months later, he was diagnosed with clinical depression. The doctors suspected he had been living with it, unrecognized, for years.

The Road and the Silence is a raw, contemplative memoir of priestly burnout, undiagnosed depression, and the difficult truth that some journeys don't heal us - they simply help us see what has been there all along.