Archive for September, 2008
Sheen’s Message Uplifting
Sunday, September 28th, 2008
“The Post and Courier”
By The Rev. Jeff Kirby
This year, two classics in the American religious tradition are being republished by Random House.
The books, “Treasure in Clay” ($15.95) and “Life of Christ” ($17.95), were written by Archbishop Fulton Sheen, who died in 1979.
The archbishop was a renowned preacher and author. He was also a media trailblazer. Starting as an early radio personality, Sheen expanded his efforts. Long before a Pat Robertson or a Joel Osteen, he became one of the first to preach the gospel on television.
Sheen wrote 73 books in his lifetime, and the reprinting of these two books provides an opportunity to explore his legacy. It also gives a forum to discuss the endurance of his teachings on several issues, including his main themes of love and freedom.
Well-remembered by generations, Sheen was known for the cadence and pitch of his voice, the intensity of his stare, and the sincerity and provocation of his message.
Who was this man? Where did he come from?
“Treasure in Clay” was the archbishop’s last book. It was an autobiography that summarized not only his life, but also his convictions. The book serves both as one man’s journey of faith and ministry and a personally experienced history of the United States and the Catholic Church.
Taken from St. Paul’s Second Letter to the Corinthians (4:7), the title of the autobiography summarizes Sheen’s belief in the frailty and glory of human life and pastoral ministry. The archbishop uses this assertion as a starting point to sharing the drama of his own life: the high calling given from God and the struggle of the person to follow it.
Comprising 21 chapters in 390 pages, the book begins with the Sheen family in El Paso, Ill. Born in 1895 and baptized as Peter John, the future bishop was known throughout his life as “Fulton.” Which was his mother’s maiden name. He was born into a small-town merchant family and was the oldest of four sons.
Educated in the parochial school system and noted for his keen intelligence, Sheen was his high school valedictorian. After high school, he went to seminary and distinguished himself as an academic and orator. On Sept. 20, 1919, the future archbishop was ordained a priest. After ordination, he was sent for further studies in Washington and Louvain, Belgium. He also attended classes at the Sorbonne in Paris and the Angelicum in Rome.
Upon returning home, Sheen did parish work and was a university professor. In 1930, he began his radio broadcast, “The Catholic Hour,” which ran for 22 years. He attracted listeners of all faiths and cultures by his human and pastoral approach to explaining religious truth.
In his teaching, Sheen employed poetry, philosophy, history, architecture, song and art to illustrate his points. But he also used humor, anecdotes and stories from his ministry. This combination made the message accessible to everyone and created an active engagement with his listeners. Many felt as if Sheen was speaking directly to them.
In 1951, he was consecrated a bishop in the Archdiocese of New York, and named an archbishop, supervising the Society for the Propagation of the Faith. The society’s task was to present Catholic teaching and encourage Christian charity.
In that same year, the new archbishop Sheen made a daring move and began his television show, ”Life is Worth Living.” Using the same approach as he had on the radio, the archbishop was a tremendous success. The United States was in the midst of radical transitions, and there was confusion and disorientation. The Depression and World War II were over, and America had to redefine itself and its place in the world. Communism was on the rise, and free society was under scrutiny.
Amid these struggles, the archbishop defended true freedom and the family and argued for the primacy of love. His teachings gave hope to all people, Catholic and non-Catholic. His presentation of the gospel provided a substantial answer to people’s questions and a worldview for their thoughts. An estimated 30 million people tuned in every week to watch and listen to him. Because of other pressing pastoral duties, the archbishop concluded his show in 1957.
In 1952, with his show having run only one year, the archbishop won an Emmy Award for the Most Outstanding Television Personality. In typical form, the archbishop in his remarks thanked his writers, “Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.” Pope Pius XII, seeing the work of the archbishop, called him “a prophet of our times.”
In the 1960s, Sheen attended the Second Vatican Council, which drastically changed the way that the Catholic Church approached the contemporary world. In many respects, the archbishop was a forerunner of this council, and his insights were a great force in its authentic application in the United States.
Due to challenging cultural shifts and the emergence of a new phase of questioning and requestioning of religious truth, the archbishop went back on television. Modeled on his previous show, “The Fulton Sheen Program” began in 1961 and ran for seven years. The new program earned Sheen the nickname, “Uncle Fultie” because of the supposed competition between his show and “The Milton Berle Show” (whose comic star was popularly known as “Uncle Miltie”). Again, the archbishop’s passionate teaching and personality made his program a great success, causing Berle to joke about Sheen, “He uses old material, too.”
One example of Sheen’s teaching can be seen in the book, “Life of Christ.” In the work, which reads as a novel, the archbishop recounts the scenes in the life of Christ by applying them to human experience, cultural trends and people’s desire for God and meaning. The book’s brief 62 chapters provide the reader with an inspiring encounter with Jesus Christ. The reader, in 658 pages, can walk with Jesus through his human life and public ministry. This ability of the archbishop to apply the gospel and show its credibility and relevancy to ordinary life is what made his approach so appealing and encouraging to people.
The archbishop concluded his show and began to work more intently on his writings. He made extensive lecture tours in the United States (including South Carolina’s Lowcountry) and throughout the world.
In 1979, only two months before his death, Sheen met Pope John Paul II during the pontiff’s visit to New York. On that occasion, the pope told the archbishop, “You have written and spoken well of the Lord Jesus. You are a loyal son of the church!”
Any list of the great people in American history would be incomplete without the name of Fulton Sheen. In difficult and turbulent times, he gave a human face to God, a compassionate heart to people’s struggles and a compelling message to edify and uplift them. Sheen’s legacy continues because people were given hope by his teaching and inspiration by his ministry.
The Rev. Jeffrey Kirby is a priest of the Diocese of Charleston.
Posted in The Post and Courier, Writing | No Comments »
Summer Camp in Aiken Teaches Youths to Live Catholic Social Justice
Thursday, September 11th, 2008
“The Catholic Miscellany”
By Amy Wise Taylor
AIKEN – Leaders at St. Mary Help of Christians Church want their youth to know about social justice and how to live it.
One of the ways they teach the concept is through a new camp they started over the summer. Joan LaBone, church youth director, said it was four intense days that ran from 8 a.m. until 9 p.m.
She said she and Father Jeffrey Kirby, parochial vicar, worked on the camp together and were barely dragging along by the end of the last day. And yet they plan to expand the program next year; to dig deeper into the issues.
“I’m very justice centered,” LaBone said. “You don’t do service because it’s a good thing to do on weekends or because it helps the community. You do it because it’s what you are called to do when you walk with Christ.”
The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops lists seven key themes of justice, and those were the focus of the camp.
On the first day, youths visited a hospital and a horse farm, where they heard talks about the dignity of work and the rights of workers.
Words were followed by action as the group labored in the fields, raking the pasture in preparation for planting grass. The youths then went to a nursing home and accompanied Father James LeBlanc, pastor of St. Mary, as he spent time with the residents and prayed with them.
Father Kirby said a key principle of Catholicism is to pray and follow, but stressed that Catholics must be active witnesses to live the faith.
The youths spent a lot of time in prayer and class-like discussions, but they also unloaded groceries at the St. Vincent de Paul center, cleaned the church, and worked in the homes and yards of parishioners.
“They felt the social implications of their discipleship,” Father Kirby said.
And they did not shy away from any of their responsibilities.
When the group went to Area Churches Together Serving for a tour and to learn how the ecumenical organization helps people of need in the community, the director of the program and the youths joined hands outside the building and prayed.
“These kids never even thought about where they were,” LaBone said. “I wish I could be that strong in my faith that I didn’t care that the whole world was riding by as I prayed.”
The youth director also applauded the dedication of a number of campers who had to balance the start of sports and band with attending camp.
Posted in Press, The Catholic Miscellany | No Comments »
Entry for Sunday, September 7, 2008
Sunday, September 7th, 2008
Blessed be God in His angels and in His saints!
The past two weeks, in the parish bulletin, the St. Paul column has been about Paul’s conversion:
Paul’s conversion is recounted in three places: Acts 9:3-8; Acts 22:6-11; Acts 26:13-15.
The main points of the account are:
Paul is thrown down and blinded (no horse is mentioned in the Bible, but it is a popular image in sacred art);
Jesus asks Paul why he is persecuting him (note that Jesus intimately associates himself with the Church);
Paul is taken to Damascus and is in great darkness;
Paul does not eat or drink for three days;
In a dream, Ananias is told to go, pray with, and minister to Paul;
Ananias goes and preaches to Paul, converts him, and baptizes him.
Posted in Blog Archive | 7 Comments »