Louis-Zéphirin was the fifth in a family of 13 children, 11 of whom reached adulthood. Not favoured by nature, he was born premature, delicate, sickly, and homely, but he did have certain gifts of intelligence. His parents felt he was unsuited for farm work, and on the advice of parish priest Charles Dion they pushed him to study, first in Bécancour, where he learned Latin under the schoolteacher Jean Lacourse, and then from 1839 to 1844 at the Séminaire de Nicolet. In May 1844, on the completion of his classical studies, the authorities in the seminary immediately asked him to replace the teacher of the fourth form (Poetry), who had fallen ill. Upon being introduced to Archbishop Joseph Signay* of Quebec, who was making a pastoral visit to Nicolet, young Moreau was accepted as a candidate for the priesthood by Signay, who let him enter holy orders and tonsured him. That autumn Moreau accompanied his pupils into the fifth form (Belles-Lettres), and also began his theological studies.
In November 1845 fatigue forced him to leave the seminary and seek refuge in the presbytery at Bécancour, where he went on studying at a slower pace. His health had not improved much by September 1846 when he met Signay. The archbishop advised him to return home and give up the religious life. At the suggestion of Dion and his teachers at Nicolet, Louis-Zéphirin went to Montreal to offer his services, armed with their letters of recommendation. He had a meeting in secret with Bishop Ignace Bourget*, who was leaving for Europe and put him in the hands of his coadjutor, Bishop Jean-Charles Prince*. Prince immediately accepted him into the episcopal palace to have him finish his theological studies, which he kept an eye on from a distance. He moved Moreau swiftly through the various stages to ordination, conferring minor orders in October 1846, the subdiaconate on 6 December, diaconate on the 13th, and priesthood on the 19th. An examination that was judged satisfactory proved he had the requisite theological knowledge and later was the basis for the conclusion that he had received “the normal training for a priest at the time in Canada.” Although Moreau devoted himself to studying for five more months and reviewed the principal theological treatises for the examinations given young priests, he would suffer all his life from a lack of depth in theological matters.
When Bishop Bourget returned in 1847, Moreau became master of ceremonies at the cathedral and gave assistance in the secretariat (chancellery). He soon advanced from under-secretary to assistant and then titular secretary. At the same time he served as chaplain to the poor at the convent of the Sisters of Charity of Providence. On 19 Dec. 1847 the chapter appointed him chaplain of the cathedral; his duties there included looking after daily mass, preaching on Sunday, and hearing confessions. They proved too onerous, however, for an inexperienced priest, and he soon left to become the director for the community of the Good Shepherd and to resume his work at the secretariat. These years of initiation into pastoral activity and diocesan administration were crucial for the future bishop: he particularly liked communal life in the Montreal episcopal palace, and he was profoundly marked by Bourget’s spirituality – a life of meditation and prayer, devotion to the Eucharist, the Blessed Heart, and Mary, and reading the Bible – and by the strong personality of this bishop who was at the heart of the religious revival of the 1840s. As a result of his work as chaplain, the young priest was already being called “good Monsieur Moreau.”
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