Adoremus will offer a series of courses dedicated to the newest translations of the Church’s liturgical texts, taking place in the oldest Catholic seminary in the United States. In partnership with St. Mary’s Seminary & University in Baltimore, MD—the cradle of Catholicism in the U.S.—Adoremus will be offering a series of non-degree, non-credit courses for the ongoing liturgical formation of priests, religious, and laity at the seminary’s Center for Continuing Formation.

Three courses will be offered between August 2026 and February 2027 in this new partnership, each focusing on a newly translated liturgical book: August 4-5, Dr. Owen Vyner will be presenting a course on the newly retranslated Order of Anointing of the Sick and of their Pastoral Care (OAS). Vyner holds a doctorate in theology and teaches as associate professor in the department of theology at Christendom College, Front Royal, VA.

A month later, September 15-18, Father Dennis Gill will be teaching a course on the revised English translation of the Order of Christian Initiation of Adults (OCIA). Father Gill currently serves as rector and pastor of the Cathedral Basilica of Sts. Peter and Paul in Philadelphia, and director of the Office for Divine Worship for the Archdiocese of Philadelphia.

Both Vyner and Father Gill are Adoremus contributors.

Rounding out the three-course offerings early next year, February 22-27, 2027, Adoremus Director Christopher Carstens will be exploring the new revisions and translation of the Second Edition of the Liturgy of the Hours (LOTH).

The revised OCIA became the mandatory text in March 2025 while the OAS became mandatory at Easter of 2026. It is anticipated that the Second Edition of the LOTH will be available for purchase beginning in January 2027.

Liturgical Partners

According to Carstens, the partnership between St. Mary’s and Adoremus fell into place with relatively little effort—especially since another Adoremus contributor, Msgr. Marc Caron has been serving as the director of the Center for Continuing Formation since July 2025.

“One of Adoremus’s principal tasks is to provide ongoing liturgical formation for priests,” Carstens explained. “In fact, Msgr. Caron has been a significant part of our work for years. When he became director of the Center for Continuing Formation, it seemed natural to continue our collaboration.”

As the new director, Msgr. Caron brings his own experiences as a priest of the Diocese of Portland, ME.

“I was interested in serving as director of the Center because I believe in ongoing formation for priests,” he said, noting that prior to his current position he served 11 years as chancellor and five years as Vicar General and Moderator of the Curia in the Diocese of Portland, ME. “In those roles over those 16 years, directly or indirectly, I was involved with ongoing priestly formation—in what we call the four pillars of formation: spiritual, intellectual, pastoral, and human formation.”

The Center for Continuing Formation was built by St. Mary’s in 1996, according to the Center’s website, “in response to the teaching on the priesthood and priestly formation of St. John Paul II. The pastoral emphasis and spirit of St. Mary’s Seminary today is perfectly expressed in The Center for Continuing Formation.”

According to Msgr. Caron, he was hired as the director to help St. Mary’s resurrect the Center after the covid pandemic.

“The Center’s program had essentially stopped because of covid,” he said. “The Center had a hard time rebooting—and so I was hired to reboot the programs at the Center. My strategy has been to try to engage existing groups who offer ongoing formation for priests and others in the Church as partners with us, rather than try to reinvent everything ourselves.”

Msgr. Caron told Adoremus that he immediately recognized that St. Mary’s and Adoremus shared essential mission goals—and it was only a matter of bringing the two together for this new venture.

“From its beginning in 1995, Adoremus has focused on promoting the liturgical life of priests and the use of liturgical books in parishes,” Msgr. Caron said. “In a similar way, St. Mary’s mission is to prepare seminarians to be priests working in parishes, and at the Center for Continuing Formation we feel we have a commitment to support the ongoing formation of priests who are working in parishes. Adoremus addresses that approach.”

Great Liturgical Books

The common theme among the three courses—a focus on new translations of liturgical texts—was intentional, Msgr. Caron said.

“In some cases, a new translation is not necessarily a major change,” he said. “However, it’s an opportunity to look at each of those rites again and to help people think about best practices, how to make full use of the various choices, options, and adaptations found in those books, and to think about how their communities could pray better with those books, to think how they can better implement the goals for the worshiping community in each of those books. That’s our hope—that it’s an opportunity for those who enroll in these courses.”

The courses being offered in this new venture, Carstens told Adoremus, will serve as an opportunity for the faithful to become reacquainted with otherwise familiar texts.

“The courses will offer a kind of ‘Great Books program,’ where the liturgical texts are the books under study,” he said. “These ritual books embody the doctrine and determine the practice of sacraments, sacramentals, and liturgical prayer of the Church.”

According to Carstens, the courses will provide spiritual, theoretical, and practical value for priests and others who enroll.

“Each course will include some historical treatment, canonical and rubrical review, and spiritual reflection,” he said. “Ultimately, though, we want to equip priests to administer and celebrate the rites intelligently, practically, and completely so that God’s people can receive the most benefit from them.”

The course on the new OAS translation, Vyner told Adoremus, “has been structured specifically for priestly ministry. The purpose of these sessions will be to provide a comprehensive and in-depth presentation of the ritual’s prayers and rubrics to enrich a priest’s ministry to the sick and dying. We will explore what is new—both significant and minor differences—and what has remained unchanged.”

Vyner said that he will draw on the Scriptures, Church teachings, development of doctrine, and the post-conciliar reform of the sacrament.

“Nevertheless, the fundamental focus will be on deepening a priest’s engagement in continuing Christ’s healing ministry,” he said. “These sessions, while incorporating lectures, will also provide opportunities for discussion and pastoral applications in the care of the sick and the dying.”

According to Father Gill, the revised English translation of the OCIA presents an opportunity for priests in the U.S. “to receive the Order more fully.”

“By this, I mean with a greater awareness of the role of the priest throughout the rites,” he told Adoremus, and “that the Order is principally liturgical and as such the work of the local parish community (priest and people), and reestablishing the distinction between accompanying the unbaptized (catechumens) and the baptized (candidates).”

Through discussion, lectures, and practicums offered during the course, Father Gill said he intends to examine the “history of the rites of Christian Initiation, the proposed reforms by the Second Vatican Council, the development of the contemporary OCIA, and its expected use in parishes in the United States, especially with regard to the revised National Statutes.”

Carstens hopes his course on the new LOTH translation will provide a meaningful encounter with this ever-ancient yet ever-new prayer of the whole Church.

“Certainly, a priest could merely buy a new ritual book and carry on as usual,” he said, “or he could take the occasion of the new Liturgy of the Hours to become reacquainted with the Psalms—what they mean, how to pray them, why to sing them—or the hymns, or to recall how the canonical hours of the Office sanctify the different hours of the day. Grace is available to us in many forms and at many times, but the Church’s liturgical prayers are privileged means and moments of grace. Entering into these revised texts taps into a treasure.”

Open Enrollment

While all the courses are designed primarily for priests, Msgr. Caron noted that the program also welcomes others involved in liturgical ministry, especially at the parish level. It is open to “priests, religious, deacons, or lay people who are full-time, part-time employees, or volunteers in the various areas.” These areas include those addressed by the program’s texts—such as “pastoral care of the sick, Catholic formation and catechesis of catechumens and candidates, and Catholics who participate in or lead parish celebrations or other celebrations of the Liturgy of the Hours.”

Carstens hopes to see a positive response among Catholics around the country to this range of courses offered at St. Mary’s.

“Certainly, the response of priest participants will be the most obvious gauge of success,” he said. “Do priests today want to understand the Church’s rites more deeply and to celebrate them more fully? Do they have the time and resources to attend our courses at St. Mary’s?”

“But a longer-range marker of success—and one less measurable by standard means,” Carstens added, “will be a fuller, more authentic reception and celebration of the Church’s revised rites. The Second Vatican Council’s Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy, Sacrosanctum Concilium, directed that pastors themselves must ‘become thoroughly imbued with the spirit and power of the liturgy’ before they can teach it to others and celebrate it as the Church intends. The Center for Continuing Formation at St. Mary’s Seminary and Adoremus are working toward this goal.”

Additional information and enrollment details regarding the courses offered by Adoremus and St. Mary’s Center for Continuing Formation will be available on the Center’s website.