St. Charles and many other martyrs for the faith died between Nov. 15, 1885, and Jan. 27, 1887, in Namugongo, Uganda. St. Charles and his companions were beatified in 1920 and canonized by Pope Paul VI in 1964.
In 1879 Catholicism began spreading in Uganda when The Society of Missionaries of Africa (the "White Fathers"), a congregation of priests founded by Cardinal Lavigerie were peacefully received by King Mutesa of Uganda.
The priests soon began preparing catechumens for baptism and before long a number of the young pages in the king's court had become Catholics.
However, on the death of Mutesa, his son Mwanga, a corrupt man who ritually engaged in pedophilic practices with the younger pages, took the throne.
When King Mwanga had a visiting Anglican bishop murdered, his chief page, Joseph Mukasa, a Catholic who went to great length to protect the younger boys from the king's lust, denounced the king's actions and was beheaded on Nov. 15, 1885.
The 25-year-old Charles Lwanga became the chief page, and just as forcibly protected them from the king's advances.
On the night of the martyrdom of Joseph Mukasa, Lwanga and some of the other pages went to the White Fathers to receive baptism.
In May 1886, King Mwanga learned that one of the boys was learning catechism. He was furious and ordered all the pages to be questioned to separate the Christians from the others. With great courage, Charles led 24 young pages, aged 13 to 25, to proclaim their Christian faith.
They were condemned to march 37 miles to their place of execution, Namugongo, where they were to be burned at the stake. On the way, Matthias Kalemba, was cut to pieces by the executioners and left to die.
On June 3, 1886, the Feast of the Ascension, Charles Lwanga was separated from the others and burned at the stake. The executioners slowly burnt his feet until there was only charred remains, but he was still alive. Then they promised they would let him go if he renounced his faith. He refused, saying, "You are burning me, but it is as if you are pouring water over my body." Just before the flames reached his heart, he looked up and said in a loud voice, "Katonda! – My God!" and died. He was only 21 years old.
There were 22 protomartyrs in all. The persecutions spread during the reign of Mwanga, with 100 Christians, both Catholics and Protestants, being tortured and killed.
— Catholic News Agency
Feast day: June 6
On June 6 the Catholic Church honors St. Norbert of Xanten – who started out as a frivolous and worldly cleric, but was changed by God's grace into a powerful preacher and an important reformer of the Church during the early 12th century. He is the founder of the Norbertine order.
Born around the year 1080 in the German town of Xanten, Norbert belonged to a high-ranking family with ties to the imperial court. As a young man he showed a high degree of intelligence and sophistication – which marked him out as a contender for offices within the Church, the state, or both. None of this, however, was any guarantee of a holy life. On the contrary, Norbert's gifts and advantages would prove to be a source of temptation even after he joined the ranks of the clergy.
Norbert was ordained as a subdeacon, and enrolled with a group of clerics in his town, before moving on to an appointment with the powerful Archbishop of Cologne. He went on to serve the German Emperor Henry V, in a position which involved the distribution of aid to the poor. In all of this, however, Norbert displayed no particular piety or personal seriousness, living a rather pleasurable and luxurious life.
His worldly outlook had been called into question in 1110, when he accompanied Emperor Henry V on a trip to Rome. The pope and emperor were involved in a long-running dispute over the right to right to choose the Church's clergy and control its properties. As their negotiations failed, Norbert was moved by the pope's argument that the Church must govern itself. At the same time, he saw his master Henry V take the extreme measure of imprisoning the pope in order to have his way in the matter.
This was not enough, in itself, to prompt a reform of Norbert's own life. That change would come from a brush with death, in approximately 1112: while riding on horseback near Xanten, he was caught in a storm and nearly killed by a lightning bolt. The frightened horse threw Norbert off, and he lay unconscious for some time. Sobered by the experience, he left his imperial post and began a period of prayer and discernment in a monastery. At age 35, he heard God calling him to the priesthood.
Radically converted to the ideals of the Gospel, Norbert was now set against the worldly attitude he had once embodied. This made him unpopular with local clerics, who responded with insults and condemnation. But Norbert was not turning back. He gave all of his wealth to the poor, reducing himself to a barefoot and begging pilgrim who possessed nothing except the means to celebrate Mass.
Pope Callixtus II gave Norbert permission to live as an itinerant preacher, and he was asked to found a religious order so that others might live after his example. He settled in the northern French region of Aisne, along with a small group of disciples who were to live according to the Rule of St. Augustine. On Dec. 25, 1121, they were established as the Canons Regular of Premontre, also known as the Premonstratensians or Norbertines.
Their founder also established a women's branch of the order, before returning to Germany for a successful preaching tour. He founded a lay branch of the Premonstratensians (the Third Order of St. Norbert), and went on to Belgium, where he preached against a sect that denied the power of the sacraments. His order was invited into many Northern European dioceses, and there was talk of making Norbert a bishop.
Though he avoided an earlier attempt to make him the Bishop of Wurzburg, Norbert was eventually chosen to become the Archbishop of Magdeburg in Germany. The archdiocese was in serious moral and financial trouble, and the new archbishop worked hard to reform it. His efforts were partly successful, but not universally accepted: Norbert was the target of three failed assassination attempts, made by opponents of his reforms.
When a dispute arose over the papal succession in 1130, Norbert traveled to Rome to support the legitimate Pope Innocent II. Afterward he returned to Germany and became a close adviser to its Emperor Lothar. In a sense, his life seems to have come full-circle: the first hints of his conversion had come on a trip to Rome two decades earlier, when he accompanied a previous emperor. This time, however, Norbert was seeking God's will, not his own advancement.
With his health failing, Norbert was brought back to Magdeburg. He died there on June 6, 1134. Pope Gregory XIII canonized St. Norbert in 1582.
— Catholic News Agency