Fulton Sheen
Archbishop Fulton Sheen will be beatified this coming Thursday, September 24 in St. Louis. He came from El Paso, Illinois. Small town, the son of a farmer. He served as an altar boy at the Cathedral of Saint Mary in Peoria and was ordained a priest for that diocese in 1919.
He did not stay small-town for long. He studied in Washington and then in Louvain, Belgium, where he earned a doctorate in philosophy and took a prize for international philosophy that no American had won before. Then he taught at the Catholic University of America for more than two decades, sharpening the one gift that would define the rest of his life: he could make a hard truth simple without making it shallow.
Before television, he reached the country by radio. The Catholic Hour ran for 20 years and pulled in millions of listeners, Catholic and not.
Then came the tv screen. Life Is Worth Living launched in the early 1950s and did something nobody expected. A bishop in a cassock, with a chalkboard and a quick wit, out-drew the biggest entertainers of his day. He won an Emmy. When he accepted it, he thanked his writers: Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.
He was named an auxiliary bishop of New York in 1951 and later Bishop of Rochester. For 16 years he led the Society for the Propagation of the Faith in the United States, raising enormous sums for the missions and, by many accounts, giving generously from his own resources as well.
He wrote more than 60 books. He gave retreats to priests all over the world. And through all of it, he kept the one discipline he said was the secret to his whole life: a daily Holy Hour before the Blessed Sacrament, which he maintained for more than 60 years.
He was a man of deep prayer who happened to be gifted on a microphone. He had a genuine devotion to Our Lady, wrote an entire book about her called The World's First Love, and prayed the Rosary every day. He taught that the Rosary keeps the soul tied to Christ through His Mother, and he lived like he meant it.
He died in 1979. His cause opened in 2002, and in 2012 the Church declared him Venerable, recognizing a life of heroic virtue. In 2019, Pope Francis approved a miracle through his intercession.
At the Mass on the 24th, he gets the title Blessed. One verified miracle is required for beatification. A second verified miracle is required for canonization and the title of Saint.
Resources for the Classroom
The Religion Teacher Lesson Plan on Fulton Sheen
Bilingual Teaching Worksheet on Fulton Sheen
Look to Him and Be Radiant Lessons for different grade levels
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