Vatican declares Fulton-Sheen Venerable

gimmebroadband

He's my all-time favourite cleric!

Pope Benedict XVI has approved the heroic virtues of US Archbishop Fulton Sheen, clearing the way for the advancement of his sainthood cause.
The announcement came just over 13 months after Bishop Daniel Jenky of Peoria, Illinois, presented Pope Benedict XVI with two thick volumes about the life of Archbishop Sheen, whose home diocese was Peoria.
The decree from the Congregation for Saints’ Causes, signed by Pope Benedict, said Archbishop Sheen heroically lived Christian virtues and was “Venerable”. Before he can be beatified, the Vatican must recognise that a miracle has occurred through his intercession.

http://www.catholicherald.co.uk/news/2012/06/28/vatican-declares-archbishop-fulton-sheen-to-be-venerable/

georgieporgy

Mine too.

When I first began to study the Faith seriously as a young man I devoured all Sheen's works. I drove to work listening to his tapes. Watched a lot of his old tv shows on tape. (hard to imagine a catholic priest getting the highest ratings on prime time tv in USA isn't it! He won 2 Emmy awards for most outstanding tv personality )

Television

In 1951 he began a weekly television program on the DuMont Television Network titled Life Is Worth Living. Filmed at the Adelphi Theatre in New York City, the program consisted of the unpaid Sheen simply speaking in front of a live audience without a script or cue cards, occasionally using a chalkboard.
The show, scheduled in a graveyard slot on Tuesday nights at 8:00 p.m., was not expected to challenge the ratings giants Milton Berle and Frank Sinatra, but did surprisingly well. Berle joked, "He uses old material, too", and observed that "f I'm going to be eased off the top by anyone, it's better that I lose to the One for whom Bishop Sheen is speaking."[5] Sheen responded in jest that people should start calling him "Uncle Fultie".[13] Life and Time magazine ran feature stories on Bishop Sheen. The number of stations carrying Life Is Worth Living jumped from three to fifteen in less than two months. There was fan mail that flowed in at a rate of 8,500 letters per week. There were four times as many requests for tickets than could be fulfilled. Admiral, the sponsor, paid the production costs in return for a one minute commercial at the opening of the show and another minute at the close. [14] In 1952, Sheen won an Emmy Award for his efforts,[15] accepting the acknowledgment by saying, "I feel it is time I pay tribute to my four writers—Matthew, Mark, Luke and John." Time called him "the first 'televangelist'", and the Archdiocese of New York could not meet the demand for tickets.[5]
One of his best-remembered presentations came in February 1953, when he forcefully denounced the Soviet regime of Joseph Stalin. Sheen gave a dramatic reading of the burial scene from Shakespeare's Julius Caesar, substituting the names of Caesar, Cassius, Mark Antony, and Brutus with those of prominent Soviet leaders Stalin, Lavrenty Beria, Georgy Malenkov, and Andrey Vyshinsky. He concluded by saying, "Stalin must one day meet his judgment." The dictator suffered a stroke a few days later and died within a week.[16]


Evangelization

Sheen was credited with helping convert a number of notable figures to the Catholic faith, including agnostic writer Heywood Broun, politician Clare Boothe Luce, automaker Henry Ford II, Communist writer Louis F. Budenz, theatrical designer Jo Mielziner, violinist and composer Fritz Kreisler, and actress Virginia Mayo. Each conversion process took an average of 25 hours of lessons, and reportedly more than 95% of his students in private instruction were baptized.[5]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fulton_J._Sheen

Festus

Splendid news! Thanks for the update Gimmebroadband

qrrgprgua

Amazing person



Fulton sheen on birth control (quote)

”The root principle of birth-control is unsound. It is a glorification of the means and a contempt of the end; it says that the pleasure which is a means to the procreation of children is good, but the children themselves are no good. In other words, to be logical, the philosophy of birth-control would commit us to a world in which trees were always blooming but never giving fruit, a world full of sign-posts that were leading nowhere. In this cosmos every tree would be a barren fig-tree and for that reason would have upon it the curse of God.”

lmaopml

I love Bishop Fulton Sheen. The irony is that it's only through the media that he has reached so very many today too, like so many that otherwise may not be known or revisited The upside, the hope! Thanks to the little Nun with a big attitude and huge heart we can tune in even still to hear him.

He was full of knowledge a great teacher, dramatic, full of insight, and brought the Gospel to life in front of your eyes, and unswerving, but most of all he really loved and he was very very kind too, and very humble behind the persona and drama he was really 'good'.

Also, he left a wealth of books with a lifetimes insight well worth reading.

“You must remember to love people, and use things, rather than to love things, and use people.”

Brer Fox

There's not too many men like Fulton Sheen nowadays.

There is Fr Robert Barron, and whilst a good speaker, he doesn't have the fire that Sheen had. He had a power and a Godly fury that would vanquish the most obnoxious of communists, or as they now like to call themselves, socialists.