Fulton Sheen, the mid-century priest whose television program Life Is Worth Living drew up to 30 million viewers, was beatified in St. Louis after a delay, at a moment when the Church again debates whether new media can serve serious faith.

Sheen deliberately entered broadcasting, treating the medium as neutral ground to be claimed; he combined philosophical depth with clear, non-condescending delivery and measured success by conversion and catechesis rather than mere audience size.

His example warns against both retreat into dullness and capitulation to spectacle, while also cautioning that personality-driven ministry can foster parasocial attachment unless the messenger remains subordinate to the message and ordinary communal life.

(UCA News) — On Sept. 24 in St. Louis, a man who once shared a network time slot with Milton Berle was declared blessed.

Fulton Sheen — priest, professor, and mid-century America’s most-watched religious broadcaster — reached a milestone delayed since 2019, when the Church paused his beatification weeks before the ceremony.

The timing was fitting.

We are living through the most chaotic religious media landscape since Sheen first stepped in front of a camera, and the Church has honored the man who saw it coming.

A voice before its time

Sheen did not stumble into broadcasting. He chose it, deliberately, when many churchmen still treated radio and television as vulgar distractions. His show, Life Is Worth Living, drew as many as 30 million viewers a week in the 1950s, a number modern preachers can only dream of.

He wore a cape, used a chalkboard, and delivered theology........

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