Domus Daily
Wednesday, June 3, 2026 | Memorial of Saint Charles Lwanga and Companions, Martyrs
Daily reflections for the whole household. Find your path at wearedomus.com/start.

Dear Catholic Parents,

The Sadducees come to Jesus with a trick question about resurrection - whose wife will she be, after seven marriages? - and he cuts straight through it: "You are greatly misled. He is not God of the dead but of the living" (Mark 12:27). Today the Church gives us 22 young men who proved that sentence with their lives. And today the Novena begins - nine days of prayer culminating in the Consecration of a nation to the Heart of the Living God. He is not God of the dead. He is God of the living. That claim is the whole of today.

📰 Quick Hits

1. Florida Sues OpenAI: "They Chose the AI Race Over the Safety of Our Kids"

Florida became the first state to sue OpenAI and its CEO Sam Altman yesterday, alleging the company knowingly marketed an unsafe product to children. Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier was direct: "Sam Altman and ChatGPT have chosen the AI race over the safety and security of our kids. They have chosen profit over public safety." The lawsuit accuses OpenAI of no effective age verification, no meaningful parental oversight, and a product that has allegedly been used to encourage self-harm, assist mass shooters, and addict minors - with more than 20 lawsuits already filed nationally over ChatGPT-related harms. The same day, Anthropic filed confidentially to go public. The AI industry is being called to account by the states while simultaneously rushing toward the markets.

Faith Lens for the Home: Pope Leo XIV's Magnifica Humanitas, released last week, is being applied in court in Florida this week. Ask your family: "What does it mean that a state has to sue a tech company to protect children? What responsibility does our family have that no lawsuit can replace?" Then check - tonight, practically - what your children can access on their devices without your knowledge. Charles Lwanga protected the boys in his charge with his life. You can do the same with a conversation and a parental control setting.

2. Pope Leo Names First Laywoman to Lead a Vatican Dicastery

Pope Leo XIV has appointed Maria Montserrat Alvarado - President of EWTN News and a former senior leader at the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty - as the new Prefect of the Vatican's Dicastery for Communication. She is the first laywoman ever to serve as prefect of a Vatican dicastery. The appointment is notable on two levels: Leo continues his pattern of choosing missionaries and communicators for significant roles, and he has placed a woman who has spent her career defending Catholic public witness in charge of how the Church speaks to the world. She has been at EWTN since 2019 and previously argued religious liberty cases at the highest levels of American law.

Faith Lens for the Home: The Church communicates through every person who lives the faith publicly - not just through official channels. Ask your family: "Who is someone we know whose public witness to the faith has made a difference in our lives? What does it look like to communicate the Gospel not just with words but with how we live?" Alvarado spent decades doing that before she was ever appointed to anything.

3. Day 1: The Sacred Heart Novena Begins Today

Today the nine-day national novena to the Sacred Heart of Jesus begins, prayed by Catholics across the country in preparation for the bishops' consecration of the nation on June 11. Each day draws from the Litany of the Sacred Heart and reflects on the wisdom of saints and popes, framed by Pope Francis's Dilexit Nos and Pope Leo XIV's Dilexi Te. Pope Leo's prayer intention for June: "Let us pray together that each one of us might find consolation in a personal relationship with Jesus, and from His Heart, learn to have compassion on the world." The full novena is free at usccb.org/novena-sacred-heart-jesus. Eight days remain before the consecration. Today is Day 1.

Faith Lens for the Home: The Sacred Heart novena is not a complicated undertaking. It is nine days of stopping - deliberately, as a household - to ask the living God to be present in your home. Ask your family tonight: "What would it mean for us to be consecrated to the Sacred Heart - not just the nation, but our household specifically, on June 11?" Then pray Day 1 together.

⛪ Family Saint Spotlight

Sts. Charles Lwanga and Companions - June 3

Twenty-two young Catholic men - pages at the court of King Mwanga II of Uganda - martyred between 1885 and 1887 for refusing to renounce their faith and for protecting younger boys from the king's predatory demands. Charles Lwanga, their leader, was 26 years old. The youngest, Kizito, was 13. On the night before the executions, Lwanga secretly baptized four of his companions who had not yet received the sacrament. The group was marched 37 miles to Namugongo and burned alive on June 3, 1886. When Lwanga's feet were set alight and he was offered his life if he would recant, he said: "You are burning me, but it is as if you are pouring water over my body." Witnesses heard him cry "Katonda!" - "My God!" - as the flames reached his heart. Eleven Anglican companions died alongside the Catholics. They are the first martyrs of sub-Saharan Africa. The site of their execution is now one of the largest Catholic pilgrimage shrines in the world - Uganda is among the most Catholic nations in Africa. The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church.

Ask at dinner: "Charles Lwanga protected younger boys with his life. What does our family do to protect the young people in our care - from spiritual dangers as much as physical ones?"

✋ One Simple Action

Pray Day 1 of the Sacred Heart Novena tonight as a family. Five minutes, One Heart. usccb.org/novena-sacred-heart-jesus. And have the conversation with your children about what they can access online - not as an interrogation, but as a shepherd's question: "What are you finding out there, and is it good for you?" Charles Lwanga asked his boys the same thing, in his own way, every day.

📚 Read More

He is not God of the dead. He is God of the living. Twenty-two young men proved it in fire in Uganda 140 years ago today. Florida proved it in a courthouse yesterday. A novena begins tonight in Catholic homes. Pray it.

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In Christ,
Deacon Michael Halbrook
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