Bishop Robert Barron used the approach of Fulton Sheen's beatification in St. Louis to warn that communism is making a comeback in the United States, casting the Catholic rite as both a celebration and a warning. He said Sheen was one of the great voices against communism in mid-20th century America and argued that churchmen should speak more forcefully now.
His remarks landed with unusual timing. Tens of thousands are expected at The Dome at America's Center on Thursday, where Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle will preside on behalf of Pope Leo XIV and Sheen will receive the title of Blessed.
The beatification also closes a long process that turned on a miracle claim involving James Fulton Engstrom, a baby born without a pulse in 2010. The Vatican approved Sheen's beatification in 2019 after recognizing his unexplained recovery, and Pope Leo XIV then approved moving forward in February after years of delays.
Barron tied Sheen's anti-communist record to the present day by saying Sheen saw communism as hostility to religion and understood that atheism was not a side issue but a core part of the ideology. In his 1948 book, Communism and the Conscience of the West, Sheen described communism as a complete philosophy of life, a framing Barron used to argue that the threat was not merely political but spiritual as well.
What Barron did not spell out was why he believes the warning fits this moment beyond the broader backdrop of communism and democratic socialism as flashpoints in American politics and the November midterms. He said churchmen need to raise their voices against the re-emergence of what he called a dangerous ideology, but he did not point to a specific new event driving that judgment.
For the Church, Thursday's ceremony is more than a formal step. It puts Sheen, a major Catholic broadcaster and author, at the center of a current American argument over faith, politics and the meaning of freedom, with Barron using the occasion to say the fight Sheen once led is not finished.
