The passive: vocatur, he is called

English makes a passive out of to be plus a participle: he calls, he is called. Latin does it with an ending in three tenses, and with two words, the English way, in the other three. Learn it as two systems.

In order: he is called, was being called, will be called, was called, had been called. The top three change the ending; the bottom two are participle plus sum.

The passive endings: -r, -ris, -tur

Swap the active personal endings for these:

Five of the six are the active ending with an -r added or swapped in. -mini is the odd one out: learn it on its own.

• Puer Marcus vocatur. - The boy is called Marcus.
• Beati pacifici, quoniam filii Dei vocabuntur. - Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God. (Matthew 5:9, in the Vulgate)

The same endings go on every conjugation. The vowel before them is the one the active already has:

Capio goes like audio: capitur, he is taken; capiuntur, they are taken.

The first sentence of Caesar's Gallic War ends on a present passive:

• qui ipsorum lingua Celtae, nostra Galli appellantur - who are called Celts in their own language, Gauls in ours (Caesar, Gallic War 1.1)

The imperfect and the future

They keep their own markers, -ba- and -bi- (or -e-), and take the same passive endings:

• Petite, et dabitur vobis. - Ask, and it will be given to you. (Matthew 7:7, in the Vulgate)

Three forms that fool readers

Duceris is you are led and you will be led; only vowel length, which this site does not mark, tells them apart. Writers often use -re for -ris, mostly outside the present. And videor means I seem far more often than I am seen: Mihi videtur is it seems to me.