(OSV News) — Of the approximately 30 million viewers of Venerable Fulton J. Sheen‘s television program “Life Is Worth Living,” a large percentage did not identify as Catholic.
Among them is Robert Oppenheim, who will be attending the archbishop’s beatification Sept. 24 in St. Louis.
Oppenheim and his Catholic wife, Caroline, will be traveling with a group from St. Agnes Parish in New York City — the church that served as Archbishop Sheen’s home parish in his final years of life.
“You really can’t be a parishioner of St. Agnes Church in New York City and not have some sort of relationship with Fulton Sheen,” Caroline told OSV News.
Archbishop Sheen’s last parish
St. Agnes’ office manager Anna Megan said the historical tie to Archbishop Sheen is strong, with some older parishioners remembering when he would preach practically every Sunday in his retirement years.
“We still have the chair that Archbishop Sheen sat in when he would preach here at Saint Agnes. We have it upstairs,” Megan said. “They used to have bullhorns out onto the street so that people could hear him and keep control of the crowds when he would preach here.”
Megan serves as the parish contact for the pilgrimage with the Canterbury Pilgrimages, the company coordinating it. She has worked at St. Agnes since 2001. She recalled watching Archbishop Sheen’s television program when it was syndicated.
“When I heard the history of Saint Agnes and him, I didn’t even realize when I was watching his preaching that it was done from here,” she said. “That’ll be great to have a big showing from New York be there for the beatification.”
Non-Catholic admiration
Both Robert and Caroline Oppenheim have a devotion to Archbishop Sheen. Robert, who grew up Jewish, has read most of Archbishop Sheen’s books, and they talk about his teachings and writings, Caroline said.
“His writings are so timely right now with what’s going on in the world, and younger generations are just discovering him now,” she said.
“I think his humor very much appeals to my husband, and the fact his show was up against Milton Berle’s show,” Caroline jokingly added.
When she saw an announcement for the pilgrimage in the parish bulletin, she reached out to Robert and immediately signed them both up.
“Saints and blessed, they pick us, so I think Bishop Sheen’s at work on Robert’s soul in some way,” Caroline said. “When I saw the pilgrimage, I just had to jump on it.”
“There’s going to be a supernatural feeling when we get there, and I know there’s going to be an abundance of graces.”
A ‘personal bond’
Another St. Agnes parishioner going on the pilgrimage, Sean D’Arcy, said he feels a “personal bond” with Archbishop Sheen because of his own experience of having met him as a small child.
So the story as told by his mother Mary D’Arcy goes, she was traveling on a train from Shelton, Connecticut, to Buffalo, New York, with her six children, including the youngest, Sean.
“Fulton Sheen jumped on the train, felt sorry for this poor woman wrestling six kids, and he asked her, ‘Do you want me to occupy and entertain one of those?’ So, she handed him me,” D’Arcy said.
Though he doesn’t remember the incident because he was still a toddler, the story has become a part of the family lore.
“He was having fun pointing things out the window, kind of goofing off with me and keeping me entertained and giving my mom a break,” D’Arcy said. “He didn’t just hide from the six kids, he engaged the outside world.”
Describing Archbishop Sheen as a “beacon of goodness,” D’Arcy said he finds inspiration not only from the archbishop’s intellectual depth but also his deep prayer life.
“We’ve got to get back into the old habits that Fulton Sheen gave us — the devotion to Mary, to praying, going to church, getting confession, getting Mass, celebrating, singing, music, intellectual depth,” he said. “Fulton Sheen was a genius, and now a genius is a saint. He’s our intellectual, and we have the history of his writings, which will be studied and read for hundreds and hundreds of years.”
Example for youth
Father Arturo Bazan, parish administrator of St. Mark Parish in Richmond, California, is leading another pilgrimage — also coordinated by Canterbury — to St. Louis and then to Archbishop Sheen’s native Peoria, Illinois. Father Bazan said Archbishop Sheen particularly appeals to younger people today and could serve as an intercessor for more vocations.
“I think Fulton Sheen will appeal to more young people now that he’s going to be beatified because I can see that a lot of young people are looking for truth and stability,” Father Bazan said. “Fulton Sheen was one of those that when you read something from him, when you hear something from him, it gives you a sense of stability and order. Young people are looking for that. So, hopefully he will bring more people and probably more vocations.”
The Mexico City native first learned about Archbishop Sheen as a seminarian when his spiritual director gave him a copy of Sheen’s “The Priest is Not His Own.” For him, this pilgrimage is “personal” because of how the soon-to-be blessed inspired him.
“When I read Fulton Sheen, it’s like, ‘Oh, this is it, this is the kind of Catholicism I’m looking for in my ministry in the future,” Father Bazan said. “He made it clear that the priesthood is not about us, it’s about Jesus Christ ministering (to) his people. The way he explains theology, you need to understand why are you doing this, and you need to grow in those virtues where you need to identify yourself with Christ, transform your life in Christ so that you can be the face of Jesus.”
Promoter of the family
Father Bazan also said that Archbishop Sheen can be an example for marriage and the family and looks to him for inspiration in some of his preaching.
“He was big on the family, and I identify with that. Most of my preaching is always towards the family, the importance of the father, the importance of the mother,” he said.
Father Robert Gahl, director of the Ecclesial Administration and Management program at the Busch School of Business at The Catholic University of America, shares that sentiment.
“One of his areas of tremendous brilliance is in how he promoted marriage formation because it’s so important to live holiness in ordinary life,” Father Gahl said. “All of this is rooted in the family and in holy families, and couples who really love one another and are open to life. Fulton Sheen with his ‘Three to Get Married’ gave a wonderful expression to how marriage entails a relationship with God and how therefore families are called to holiness.”
CUA alumnus
A priest of the Personal Prelature of Opus Dei, Father Gahl is also leading a pilgrimage to St. Louis. He said he finds inspiration teaching at a university where Archbishop Sheen was both a student and later taught as a professor.
“He’s our first alum and faculty member who’s going to be beatified,” Father Gahl told OSV News.
“I’m so impressed and inspired by Fulton Sheen because he was so faithful to Church teaching while at the same time being as extraordinarily innovative in how he communicated Church teaching and how he used the most advanced media of his day. This inspires us in the church management program to also be innovative in how we spread the Gospel and how we give formation.”
Impact on the margins
As president and executive director of the Fulton Sheen Prayer Group Apostolate based in San Antonio, Jorge Aguilar said that while he was disappointed that the beatification was postponed seven years ago, now is the right time.
“Fulton Sheen is such a great teacher. He teaches individuals through reason, and he leads them to an understanding of truth,” Aguilar said. “I’m so elated that this is happening because it’s bringing the Church to a deeper understanding, that life is worth living.”
Aguilar will be traveling to St. Louis for the beatification with other members of his apostolate, which uses Archbishop Sheen’s teachings in prison ministry. He has seen the impact the late prelate has made on the incarcerated, and prisoners have responded with excitement to the beatification.
“When someone has that encounter in that environment, they have this tendency to really gravitate to the one who brought them to that knowledge. They look to Fulton Sheen as a great prophet and are very thankful,” Aguilar said.
While many people are concerned about the future, with apocalyptic predictions about divisions and calamities impacting the Church and the world, Aguilar said that Archbishop Sheen saw something different.
“He said that a day of a great revival would happen within the Church but it would not be from the top down, it would be from the bottom up,” he said.
“I believe that in the prisons throughout America, that men and women are hearing the voice of Fulton Sheen. They’re being drawn to an understanding that God has a plan, and they’re part of it,” Aguilar added. “And the greatest part of that plan is that God is calling them to offer up their sufferings with Christ on the cross for the salvation of souls.”
Tony Gutiérrez is an OSV News correspondent. He writes from Texas.
