General

The Feast of St Joseph, Wednesday 19th March 2025

Please note that this Mass will now be at 6.30pm and not 10am as first advertised.

Sancte Joseph, ora pro nobis!

Healthcare Guild: Father Sean is hoping to establish a health care guild in our Parish. It will be open to all registered health care professionals (HCPC, GMC, NMC) and those who are retired. Its purpose is to explore, in a supportive environment, how we live our catholic faith in health practice. Exploring ethical issues and the teaching of the church. There will be an initial meeting towards the end of February (date to follow) to discuss the ideas of the guild.

His Eminence, Raymond Leo Cardinal Burke, ordained Canon Andrew Morrow to the sacred priesthood on January 29th, 2024, the feast of our co-patron, St. Francis de Sales.

Shortly before the first year as a priest will end, Canon Morrow will come to Shrewsbury to celebrate his ‘First Mass in Shrewsbury’: We are happy to invite you and your family and friends to join us on January 12th, at 12:30 pm. After Mass, Canon Morrow will impart the first blessing of a newly ordained priest.

Please note that the Mass on Friday, December 20th will be celebrated at 9:00 am (instead of 10:00 am). Thank you for your understanding.

Be advised that Safeguarding at St Winefride’s is taken care of by the Cathedral-parish. The safeguarding representative is Mr Tony Burns.

Contact email: or via the Parish Office on 01743 290000 and the diocesan safeguarding coordinator is Andrew O’Brien (0151 652 9855).

Canon Wiener will be away during the week of Monday, November 11th to Saturday, November 16th, to participate in the obligatory annual retreat in Germany. All Masses that are scheduled during this time will be celebrated in the listed intentions by Canon in at the Institute’s church in Maria Engelport. Canon is expected to be back in Shrewsbury on Sunday, November 17th.

Please note change from usual Mass time: Mass on this day will be at 6.30 in the evening on this Holy Day of Obligation.

During the Annual Chapter meeting in Gricigliano during the last week of August, the weekday Masses Monday through Saturday (August 26-31) will be cancelled. Canon Wiener will continue to celebrate daily Mass at the Institute’s mother house in the intentions published in the Newsletter for that time.

Last Sunday’s External Solemnity of the feast of SS. Peter & Paul coincided with the anniversary of my priestly ordination by Cardinal Burke (then Bishop of La Crosse in Wisconsin, USA) 25 years ago in Gricigliano.

I thank Our Lord Jesus Christ and His Church every day for having called me to the Catholic priesthood. I am most grateful to my superiors in the Institute, especially to our Prior General, Msgr. Gilles Wach, to Canon Phillippe Mora, the cofounder of our Institute and rector of the seminary in Gricigliano, and to Msgr. Michael Schmitz, Vicar General in the Institute; I thank them for the patient and fatherly support they gave me, and continue to give, throughout the seminary years and thereafter in various apostolates in Europe and the United States.

I thank also my late parents and my sister for their loving support. And here in Shrewsbury I wish to thank you, dear faithful, for your always generous loyalty toward the Church and its perennial teachings as toward the priests of the Church who want to serve God and your families.

At last Sunday’s visit of my superior and Provincial, Canon Amaury Montjean and the four Sister Adorers of the Royal Heart of Jesus Christ Sovereign Priest, you demonstrated once again your great love and reverence for the clergy of the Institute since its arrival in Shrewsbury six years ago. I thank you for all your most generous gifts and cards I have received and for your kind participation in the acquisition of a beautiful chalice pall. Your love for Jesus Christ and His priests is a great encouragement for me and my confreres. May God bless you and reward you for all your spiritual and material support.