Peoria-area native Archbishop Fulton Sheen will be beatified Sept. 24 in St. Louis — the first beatification ever held in Missouri.
St. Mary's Church in El Paso will host a watch party for the ceremony in the same parish hall where Sheen was baptized.
Beth Miller, a parish member and president of the Woodford County Historical and Genealogical Society, said people often forget Sheen's ties to El Paso.
"I just don't know if they realize how important he's been to the faith," Miller said. "Some of the older folks do, but the younger ones don't have ideas."
Miller said Sheen visited the church several times throughout his life to connect with the community, and that his history often is tied to Peoria instead of El Paso, where he spent his earliest years.
"I guess Peoria is trying to take him over, but we kind of want to keep him as part of our heritage," Miller said.
The watch party will be held Sept. 24 at the new parish hall, on the site of the church where Sheen was baptized. Church members and anyone interested in attending are invited to gather at 10 a.m. to watch a livestream of the pre-show and the beatification Mass.
The Mass will be celebrated at 2 p.m. CDT at The Dome at America's Center in St. Louis, with Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle presiding on behalf of Pope Leo XIV. Sheen's beatification, once scheduled for December 2019, was delayed for six years before the Vatican cleared it to proceed earlier this year.
Sheen was born in El Paso in 1895 and was ordained a priest in Peoria in 1919. He wrote several books and was a famous televangelist before his death in 1979. His tomb is located in Peoria's Cathedral of St. Mary of the Immaculate Conception.
Tickets for the St. Louis beatification are available through the Archbishop Fulton Sheen Foundation at celebratesheen.com.
