Lenten Pastoral Letter A Church Ready for Converts To be read at all Masses on the First Sunday of Lent 22nd February 2026.
Lenten Pastoral Letter
A Church Ready for Converts
To be read at all Masses on the First Sunday of Lent 22nd February 2026
My dear brothers and sisters,
As Lent begins, we see a growing number of men and women, many of them young adults, who are seeking faith and baptism. This stream of new converts is evident across our Diocese and country and indeed across the western world.
As Shrewsbury Diocese began its mission some 175 years ago, Saint John Henry Newman spoke of “a Church ready for converts.” Seeing so many today, often coming from no religious background to find the faith of the Church, I recalled these words of Cardinal Newman.
The journey of these new converts brings us back to the original purpose of Lent as the time when adults prepared for Baptism. The Church quickly recognised this time was needed by all the baptised as part of their continuing conversion.
It is for this reason, that we now keep these 40 Lenten days devoted to greater prayer, self-denial and generosity as we each prepare to renew at Easter the promises of our Baptism.
May we truly be a Church of converts, that is always “ready for converts.”
United in this prayer, and as a convert with you,
+ Mark, Bishop of Shrewsbury
Mark Davies, born in Manchester on May 12, 1959, was baptised at St Richard’s Church. He attended local schools before training for priesthood at Ushaw College. Ordained in 1984, he served in various parishes and became private secretary to Archbishop Patrick Kelly in 1988. From 1992 to 2003, he was parish priest of St. John Bosco and Dean of North Manchester. In 2003, he was appointed Vicar General of Salford Diocese, serving in multiple parishes until 2009. Appointed Coadjutor Bishop of Shrewsbury in 2009, he became the 11th Bishop of Shrewsbury in 2010.
