From tattoo artist to theology student, one woman’s journey traces a return—not to where she started, but to who she was always meant to be.
Some callings arrive quietly. Others interrupt. For Shenelle Simon, the path to ministry was neither linear nor predictable. It unfolded across continents, careers, and questions, through art studios and business ventures, through distance from faith and a gradual return to it.
Today, she sits on the cusp of her next chapter not just as a theology student, but as someone whose journey is less about a single decision and more about a series of returns, each one bringing her closer to a calling she had once set aside.
“I knew I was searching for Him… but He was searching for me first.”
A Faith Inherited, and Interrupted
Shenelle’s story begins in Antigua, in the quiet consistency of family. Raised in a Seventh-day Adventist home shaped by the influence of her grandmother and mother, she represents a third generation of women rooted in the church. Mornings began with worship. Church was not performance; it was presence.
Jesus, she says, was not abstract. “He was like my friend… almost like a brother.” She saw faith lived; her mother, a national athlete, refused to play netball on Sabbath, even at competitive levels.
But inheritance does not guarantee permanence. At twelve, her understanding of faith fractured. A traumatic experience within the church disrupted everything she believed about safety, trust, and God. She still attended church, but now out of routine, not relationship. Faith became something external. Cultural. Expected. And eventually, something she left behind.
Across Continents, Away from Calling
Adulthood took her far from Antigua, and further from ministry. As she grew older, her life took a different direction, one defined by creativity, ambition, and independence. She pursued higher education abroad, earning a degree in industrial design in Russia and a master’s in international business innovation in Spain, credentials that pointed toward a future of structure, ambition, and independence.
It was a life far removed from ministry, and intentionally so. “I went to do my own thing,” she says simply. That “thing” became art. More specifically, tattooing. It was, at first, a contradiction, “As a child, I said I would never do tattoos… because of my religion.” But life has a way of redrawing boundaries.
After time spent around a tattoo shop in New Jersey, she learned the craft, saved money, and made a bold decision: she left her job and returned to Antigua to open her own studio.
The Studio Becomes a Sanctuary
The turning began in a tattoo studio, an expression of her lifelong love for art. It was an unlikely space for spiritual rediscovery, but it became exactly that. At first, faith remained peripheral. But over time, small shifts began to take root.
Her grandmother, still steady, asked simple questions: “Are you involving God in your business?” At first, Shenelle resisted. Why would she? But her grandmother did not argue. Her presence—gentle, persistent, and deeply rooted in love—became a quiet catalyst.
“I was able to see God’s love through her,” Simon reflects. Conversations stretched late into the night. Questions deepened. And slowly, almost imperceptibly, her relationship with God began to rebuild. She began to pray again. To read again. To listen again.
What changed was not her environment, but her awareness. And the studio changed. Biblical artwork began to fill the walls, paintings inspired by scripture. Conversations with clients deepened. What started as a business space became something else entirely.
“I would testify… I would witness to people in the shop.” Looking back, she recognizes what she could not see then: “He was working with me where I was.”
The Question That Changed Everything
Attending YUTCAH, a youth congress in Trinidad, something shifted. She immersed herself completely, attending every session, absorbing every word. “It was as if I couldn’t get enough.” Then came the question, pressed from within. In the quiet pages of a notebook, she wrote the question that had been forming beneath everything: Why am I here?
During a session led by a theology lecturer, an appeal was made for those considering ministry. She resisted. Internally, she negotiated. “I was like, God… not this. Anything but this.” A stranger sat beside her, “You’re wrestling,” he said. She was.
That night, she walked the campus. Sat under a streetlight. Argued. Bargained. “I tried to make deals with God.” Eventually, she surrendered. The next day, she signed the forms.
Shenelle returned to Antigua. Sold everything—her car, her equipment, her inventory. Used the money to fund her first semester. And came to USC.
Finding Belonging, By Letting Go of It
At USC, she did not immediately feel like she belonged. “I didn’t want to stay,” she admits. A tattoo sleeve. A background in art and business. A woman in a space where women in theology are still rare. “I didn’t look like what people expect.”
But something else happened. The community embraced her. “When I came here, it felt like I was always here.” Slowly, she changed, not by force, but by participation. She joined activities. Engaged with others. Stepped out of her comfort zone.
Faith, Reframed
Her story resists easy categorization. It is not simply one of departure and return, but of integration—bringing together art, business, struggle, and spirituality into a more complete understanding of purpose. Her journey challenges assumptions about what ministry looks like, and where it begins.
One of the clearest expressions of that growth came through a mural project with the St. Joseph Police Youth Club.
What began as a question, “What do I do with my art now?”, became an answer. She collaborated with iProvide, a campus outreach ministry, on the mural. Secured materials through what she describes as “a miracle.” Around the same time, she also helped to launch USC Artistry, the university’s first art club, creating space for others to explore creativity as an expression of purpose.
“I think God was saying… I’ll give you a bigger canvas.” Her art did not disappear when she chose ministry. It expanded.
A Chapter Closing—and Another Beginning
Now, her time at USC is ending sooner than expected. Her next step: pursuing a Master of Divinity. It is a leap of faith. “We’re at a trust curve now,” she says. But she is not the same person who arrived. Where she once moved easily from place to place without attachment, she now leaves with something unfamiliar: A heavy heart. “I’ve made brothers and sisters here,” she says. “That’s new for me.”
The Legacy She Leaves
When asked what she hopes people remember, her answer is simple: Impact. “That I added something… that I helped someone get closer to who they could be.”
She reflects on something she has noticed across her life, every place she leaves—roads are paved shortly after. Antigua. New Jersey. Now Trinidad. She laughs at the pattern, but sees meaning in it. “No matter how rough the road is… it gets better.”
Becoming, Still
Shenelle Simon does not present her story as finished. It is still unfolding, stretching, refining, becoming. But one thing is settled – she answered the call. Where there was once distance, there is now pursuit. Where there was once uncertainty, there is now trust.
Her path—from Antigua to Russia to Spain to Trinidad, from ink to theology—does not follow a conventional narrative. But perhaps that is the point; some journeys are not meant to be linear, they are meant to be lived.
And for those still unsure, still hesitant, still listening but not responding, her advice is clear: “If the phone is ringing… answer it.”
Because some callings are not about becoming someone new. They are about returning fully, finally to who you were always meant to be.
