NEW YORK (NY)
Crux
December 8, 2019
By John L. Allen Jr.
Now that we know why the scheduled Dec. 21 beatification ceremony for the late Archbishop Fulton Sheen has been postponed, it raises broader questions about how we evaluate not only potential candidates for sainthood, but those who’ve already crossed the finish line, vis-à-vis the clerical sexual abuse scandals.
After being initially reported that the Vatican had postponed the beatification at the request of a “few U.S. bishops,” the Diocese of Rochester, where Sheen served as an auxiliary bishop from 1959 to 1966 and as the bishop until his retirement in 1969, acknowledged in a statement that it had requested the delay “to allow for further review of his role in priests’ assignments.”
To be clear, there’s no suggestion of any personal misconduct by Sheen. An official in Sheen’s home diocese of Peoria, Illinois, which spearheaded the beatification cause, told reporters the concerns focus on a particular Rochester priest accused of sexual misconduct during Sheen’s years as a bishop, but insisted that the case had been thoroughly investigated and no mishandling by Sheen was discovered.
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