At America’s Oldest Seminary, a New Approach to Training Priests

St. Mary’s Seminary in Baltimore — founded 1791 — is helping its seminarians become the best priests they can be.

St. Mary’s Seminary in Baltimore — founded 1791 — may be the oldest seminary in the country, but its approach to helping its seminarians become the best priests they can be is very new.

When Sulpician Father Phillip Brown took leadership of the seminary as rector in 2016, he came on a mission to revamp the way it trains priests. After a period of thorough observation, seminary leadership realized that St. Mary’s had a problem. While — true to its reputation — its academic programs were strong, they concluded that an overemphasis on study was causing other important aspects of the seminarians’ training to fall by the wayside.

While courses on Scripture, moral theology, and Church history are essential to make priests effective teachers and witnesses to the Gospel, knowledge alone is not enough. Father Brown recognized that the seminary could be doing more to raise up priests who are holy, well-adjusted and able to care for their people.

Seminarians from dioceses like Buffalo, Louisville, Richmond, and even Kumbo, Cameroon, spend their final four years before ordination at St. Mary’s. The new approach has resonated with them.

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