Lawsuit over Archbishop Fulton Sheen's final resting place

Archbishop Fulton Sheen became a famous television personality in the 1950s with his program "Life Is Worth Living," which drew as many as 10 million viewers each week. Beloved in New York City, Sheen's path to becoming a saint has been stalled because of a legal fight about his final resting place.

Right now, Sheen's remains are inside the crypt in St. Patrick's Cathedral in New York City. Sheen's niece Joan Sheen Cunningham has taken the cathedral's trustees to court because she wants her uncle's remains moved to Peoria, Illinois, where he grew up.

Monsignor Hilary Franco was Sheen's good friend. Sheen told Franco directly that he wanted to be buried in New York City, Franco said.

Just last week, a judge sided with Sheen's niece and agreed that the remains could be moved back to Illinois.

But the Archdiocese of New York appealed that ruling. This week, the archdiocese won the right to keep Sheen's remains at St. Patrick's Cathedral until the matter is settled in the courts.

Sheen's niece has said that he would have wanted to have been interred in Peoria if he knew that he would be considered for sainthood. That is why she filed a legal complaint in 2016 seeking to have her uncle's remains moved there.

Sheen is on the path to becoming a saint because he is credited with the miraculous recovery of a newborn in the Peoria area.