From Vatican II Exposed as Counterfeit Catholicism by Frs. Francisco and Dominic Radecki, CMRI
ARCHBISHOP FULTON SHEEN
Fulton Sheen was the most charismatic religious figure in American history. Peter Sheen, who was born in El Paso, Illinois on May 8, 1895, soon began to be called by his mother’s maiden name, Fulton. After Vatican II, he became a champion of Modernism. How did this occur?
SHEEN’S MENTOR, BISHOP JOHN SPALDING
After Fulton Sheen served Mass for Bishop Spalding (1840-1916) at Peoria Cathedral, the prelate told him he would sponsor him to study in Louvain, Belgium. Sheen was ordained a diocesan priest in Peoria, Illinois on September 20, 1919. Bishop John Spalding had also studied at Louvain, Belgium and had been ordained there on December 19, 1863. He and his uncle, Archbishop Martin Spalding of Baltimore, who founded the American College of Louvain in 1857, established the Catholic University of America in 1889. Archbishop Spalding opposed Freemasonry, Modernism and False Religious Liberty. Both prelates attended Councils held in Baltimore during the nineteenth century. The Catholic University of Louvain and the Catholic University of America may have had good beginnings, but both became Modernist centers by the early or mid-twentieth century.
ON TO LOUVAIN
Sheen studied at the Catholic University for two years (1920-1922) and then took philosophy courses at the Catholic University of Louvain for a year. In 1923, he took classes at the Sorbonne in Paris and the Angelicum in Rome and returned to Louvain, where he received his doctorate in philosophy and received the Cardinal Mercier Award for his thesis. After some parish work, Sheen began teaching the philosophy of religion and other subjects at the Catholic University of America in Washington, DC in 1926. His career was just beginning.
THE “PROFESSIONAL” THEOLOGIAN
Sheen pioneered the era of professional theologians, who sold millions of books, are known by their secular names (See, Ratzinger, Kung, etc.) and were very influential at Vatican II. It is interesting to note that the title page in a number of Sheen’s books stress his training at Louvain, professing he is a member of a special, elite group. America was a major obstacle to the revolutionary changes proposed at Vatican II. Modernists knew they had to convince thinking Americans that the alterations on doctrine and worship were just a part of keeping up with the times. His training at Louvain taught Sheen how to make Modernism palatable and socially acceptable to Americans.