Archbishop Fulton Sheen is set to be beatified on September 24, at a Mass celebrated at The Dome at America’s Center in St Louis, Missouri.
To watch the Mass, EWTN is hosting a free livestream on its YouTube page. The Mass begins at 2pm CDT (8pm BST), and coverage of the beatification will begin at 1.30pm CDT (7.30pm BST).
Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle, Pro-Prefect of the Section for First Evangelization and New Particular Churches of the Dicastery for Evangelization, will be the principal celebrant of the Mass.
Archbishop Fulton Sheen is the first US-born bishop to be beatified, and the fourth US-born priest to be beatified.
Born and raised near Peoria, Illinois, Archbishop Sheen was ordained a priest in 1919 for the Diocese of Peoria. He spent much of his early priesthood studying at the Catholic University of America and at Catholic University of Leuven in Belgium, before going to Rome to attend the Angelicum. He returned to the United States in 1926.
Archbishop Sheen spent nearly a quarter of a century at the Catholic University of America. While he was there, he taught theology and philosophy, and also began his radio programme, “The Catholic Hour”.
In 1951, Archbishop Sheen was consecrated as an auxiliary bishop of New York, and that autumn began his television show, “Life is Worth Living”. Archbishop Sheen would be nominated for three Emmy Awards for this show, winning one for “Most Outstanding Television Personality” in 1952. “Life is Worth Living” ran until 1957.
From 1961-1968, Archbishop Sheen was the host of “The Fulton Sheen Program”.
Archbishop Sheen died on December 9, 1979, at the age of 84.
The Diocese of Peoria formally opened Archbishop Sheen’s cause for canonisation in 2002. In 2019, Pope Francis approved a miracle attributed to Archbishop Sheen’s intercession, the healing of a stillborn child in Washington, Illinois.
That child, James Fulton Engstrom, is now 15 years old and will be present at Thursday’s Mass.
Sheen’s beatification was initially scheduled for December 2019 before being abruptly cancelled just days before it was due to take place in Peoria. In February 2026, the Vatican announced the new date and location.
This is just the fifth beatification to occur on US soil. The most recent was that of Bl Michael McGivney, founder of the Knights of Columbus, who was beatified at a Mass in Hartford, Connecticut, on October 31, 2020.
The next beatification in the United States will be that of the Georgia Martyrs – five Franciscan priests who were martyred in September 1597 in what is now the US state of Georgia.
