Finding True Happiness

Are you perfectly happy, or are you still looking for perfect happiness?

Most people are still actively searching for true and lasting happiness, but are looking in the wrong places. It's easy to be misled into believing that happiness is found in money, rank, or renown. While these things are not inherently bad, and can in fact be used to do much good, they will, in the final analysis, not bring a happiness that endures.

Once we realize that nothing less than a complete union with God will satisfy our souls, we will not let transitory things distract or disappoint us. This is because then, according to Fulton Sheen, you put no more hope in things than they can bear. You cease looking for first-rate joys where there are only tenth-rate pleasures.

In addition to addressing the topic of joy vs. pleasure in Finding True Happiness, Fulton Sheen also helps us gain the right perspective on things such as loneliness and the secret of sanctity. This brings us to our ultimate purpose, which is found in God alone. Only by losing oneself in God, will we find our true selves—and true happiness along with it.

Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen is arguably the most beloved Catholic televangelist and radio personality of modern times. At the age of 24, Sheen was ordained a priest and began to capture the hearts and minds of people through his preaching and teaching of the Gospel in a way that was relevant and easy to understand.

In 1930, Sheen began and hosted a weekly Sunday night radio broadcast The Catholic Hour, drawing an audience of four million people each week for two decades until he was appointed auxiliary bishop of the Archdiocese of New York in 1951. Sheen also hosted a Catholic television program Life is Worth Living for which he won an Emmy Award in 1952 for Most Outstanding Television Personality . The show ran until 1957, luring as many as 30 million weekly viewers.

Pope John Paul II spoke warmly of Archbishop Sheen: You have written and spoken well of the Lord Jesus. You have been a loyal son of the Church!

In addition to his work as a televangelist, Sheen was also the author of many renowned books, including Way to Inner Peace, Life is Worth Living, and The Priest is not His Own. In 2002, Bishop Daniel Jenky, CSC, of the Diocese of Peoria, IL officially opened the cause for Sheen's beatification and canonization.