Privacy Policy

Domus Formation, Inc. Last Updated: July 19, 2026

Domus Formation, Inc. ("we," "us," or "our") is committed to protecting your privacy. This Privacy Policy explains how we collect, use, disclose, and safeguard your information when you use any of our websites and services (collectively, the "Services"):

  • WeAreDomus.com (Domus Formation)
  • HearthAndAltar.com (Hearth & Altar)
  • HogarYAltar.com (Hogar y Altar)
  • EventideAndAltar.com (Eventide & Altar)
  • OcasoYAltar.com (Ocaso y Altar)
  • YoungDisciplesSociety.com (Young Disciples Society)
  • EmmausDisciples.com (Emmaus Disciples)
  • DeaconLife.com (Deacon Life)
  • community.DeaconLife.com (Deacon Life Community)
  • ParishPrayers.com (Parish Prayers)

By using any of our Services, you agree to the practices described in this policy.

1. Information We Collect

Information You Provide

We collect information you voluntarily provide when you create an account, subscribe to a service, make a payment, contact us with questions or feedback, or refer others to our Services. This information may include:

  • Name and family name
  • Email address
  • Mailing address (if provided)
  • Diocese and parish affiliation
  • Ministry role (for parish-facing Services such as Parish Prayers, Emmaus Disciples, or Deacon Life)
  • Payment information (processed securely by Stripe - see Payment Processing below)

Usage Analytics

We collect anonymized usage data to improve our Services and understand how our community engages with our content. This includes:

  • Activity data: Pages visited, visit frequency, and time of access
  • Device information: Device type (mobile, tablet, desktop), operating system, and browser type
  • Engagement metrics: Login frequency and content viewing patterns

This data helps us improve content and features, understand peak usage times to ensure reliable service, and make informed decisions about future development.

Mobile Applications

When you use our mobile applications (such as the & Altar app), we may collect:

  • Device identifiers (for authentication and account access)
  • App version and operating system
  • Push notification tokens (if you enable notifications)
  • Crash reports and performance data (to improve app stability)

We do not collect precise location data. Our mobile apps offer in-app purchases for subscription access through the Apple App Store and Google Play Store.

Personal Practice Data (Fasting and Almsgiving)

When you use the Fast or Give features of Domus, we collect and store information about your intentional participation in these spiritual practices:

  • Dates on which you engaged with a Fast or Give invitation
  • Optional intentions you provide when offering a fast or gift (e.g., who or what you are offering for)
  • Your personal streak of consecutive days of participation
  • Historical patterns of your practice over time

This information is entirely personal to you and is treated as private data. Details on how this data is shared (or not shared) are provided in the Personal Practice Tracking section below.

Group Participation Data

When you participate in Groups (voluntary Catholic associations of adult subscribers), we collect and store:

  • Groups you have created or joined
  • Your role within each Group (member or founder)
  • Prayer intentions you share within Groups
  • Bulletin board posts you create in Groups
  • Feast day observance participation within Groups
  • Group invitation codes issued or received
  • Group patron selections

Details on how Group data is shared with other Group members are provided in the Groups and Group Membership section below.

Adult Tagging Data

Household owners (Primary Subscribers) may tag Household members as Adult (18+) or Not yet an adult. We collect and store:

  • Adult tag status for each Household member (set by the Primary Subscriber)
  • Timestamp of when tags were set or changed
  • History of tag changes for audit purposes

This information enables Groups access controls and is not shared outside the Household.

User-Generated Content

If our Services include community features such as comments, forums, or discussion areas, we collect the content you submit.

2. Community Features and Member Profiles

Some of our Services include community features that enable members to interact with one another. Currently, this includes the Deacon Life Community at community.deaconlife.com, and may expand to other properties in the future. Because these features involve richer personal data and member-to-member visibility, this section describes how we handle that information.

Profile Information

When you join a community, you may provide additional profile information beyond your basic account, including:

  • Profile photograph
  • Biographical text
  • Ordination date (Deacon Life)
  • Diocese and parish affiliation
  • City and state
  • Phone number

Your profile photograph is resized and stored on our servers (as a 200x200 pixel thumbnail and a 400x400 pixel profile image). Original uploads are not retained after processing.

Member Directory Visibility

Community members are included in the member directory by default. Within the directory, other community members can see your name, profile photo, diocese, parish, ordination date, and bio. You control whether your email address and phone number are visible to other members through your profile settings. You may opt out of the member directory entirely at any time from your profile page. Opting out hides your profile from directory search and browsing but does not remove your name from posts or comments you have made.

User-Generated Content

When you participate in community features, we collect and store the content you create, including:

  • Feed posts (text and images)
  • Comments on posts
  • Forum threads and replies
  • Reactions (likes and prayer reactions)
  • Resource submissions (URLs and uploaded files)

Post images are resized for display (1200 pixel wide display image, 400 pixel thumbnail) and stored on our servers. Original uploads are not retained after processing. A maximum of four images may be attached per post, with a 5 MB limit per image.

Resource file uploads (PDF, Word, PowerPoint, Excel, and image files) are stored on our servers with a 25 MB size limit per file.

Post Edit History

When you edit a post, we retain the previous version in an edit history log. This history is used for moderation purposes and is not publicly visible.

Reactions and Engagement Data

We track reactions (likes and prayers) you give and receive, comment activity, and forum participation. This data is used to power notification features and is visible to other community members as described (for example, other members can see that you liked or prayed for a post).

Badges and Milestones

We may automatically calculate and display badges based on information you provide, such as ordination milestones calculated from your ordination date. Badges are visible on your posts, comments, and profile. Founding member status is assigned automatically based on when you joined the community.

Notifications and Email Digests

You choose your notification preferences for each type of community activity. Options include immediate email notification, inclusion in a daily or weekly digest, or no notification. We use these preferences to send you emails via our email service provider. You can change your notification preferences at any time from your community settings page.

Digest emails are sent at the following times:

  • Daily digest: 6:00 AM Central Time
  • Weekly digest: Saturday at 6:00 AM Central Time

Link Previews

When you include a URL in a post, our system may automatically retrieve preview information (title, description, and thumbnail image) from the linked page using standard Open Graph metadata. This retrieval is performed by our server at the time of posting and does not expose your personal information to the linked site.

How Community Data Is Shared with Other Members

Community features are inherently social. Other members of your community can see:

  • Your name, profile photo, and bio on your posts and comments
  • Your diocese, parish, and ordination date (if you have provided them)
  • Your reactions to their posts (e.g., "Deacon Michael prayed for this")
  • Your badge and milestone designations
  • Your directory listing (unless you opt out)

Your email address and phone number are never visible to other members unless you explicitly enable that visibility in your profile settings.

Community Data Retention

If you cancel your community subscription, your profile and posts remain visible to other members unless you request deletion. If you request account deletion, we will remove your profile information and anonymize your posts and comments (replacing your name with "Former Member") within 30 days. Forum threads you created will remain with anonymized authorship to preserve conversation continuity for other members.

Moderation

Community administrators may review, edit, pin, lock, or remove any user-generated content to maintain the community's standards and mission. Moderation actions are logged internally and are not publicly visible.

3. Family Features and Household Sharing

Some of our Services include household features that allow families to share prayer practice, feast day observances, and prayer intentions within a household group. Households are subscription groups of up to 6 family members. Because these features involve visible sharing of engagement data and prayer intentions among family members, this section describes how we handle that information.

Household Membership

A household is created when a Primary Subscriber invites family members to join their household subscription. The Primary Subscriber controls billing and household membership. Household members may include:

  • Primary Subscriber (typically a parent, spouse, or head of household)
  • Adult Household Members (spouse, adult children, or other adults)
  • Minor Household Members (children under 18 with parental consent)

Each household member has their own account, path subscriptions, and personal data. Household membership creates a shared context for family formation, but each member's individual account and personal data remain their own.

What Household Members Can See About Each Other

By default, household members can see the following information about each other:

  • Which prayer paths each household member is engaged with (for example, "Mom is on Vessel & Altar; Dad is on Iron & Altar")
  • Whether household members have opened today's content for their paths (an awareness pattern, not detailed activity)
  • Feast day observances the household has planned or completed together
  • Prayer intentions members choose to share with the household
  • Names, profile photos, and household roles

Household members cannot see, by default:

  • The specific content each member has viewed
  • Time spent in prayer or reflection
  • Personal reflections, notes, or private prayer intentions members have chosen to keep personal
  • Individual account settings or preferences

Privacy Controls Within Households

Each household member can control what they share with the household through their personal privacy settings, including:

  • Whether their engagement patterns are visible to other household members
  • Whether their prayer intentions are shared with the household or kept personal
  • Whether their observance participation is visible to other household members

By default, engagement patterns and observance participation are visible to household members; prayer intentions are personal unless the member explicitly shares them.

Minor Household Members and Parental Controls

For household members under 18:

  • Under 13: Parental consent is required before the child can join a household. The Primary Subscriber must be a parent or legal guardian. We collect only the minimum information necessary. Adults in the household have visibility over minor children's participation and settings. This complies with the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA).
  • 13-17: The Primary Subscriber (as parent or guardian) grants permission for the minor to join. The minor may have their own account with age-appropriate privacy controls. Parents can review, modify, or delete their child's account and data at any time.

Parents may contact us at [email protected] to review, correct, or delete their child's information, or to withdraw consent for further collection.

Household Data Retention

If a household member leaves a household (voluntarily or due to household changes), their personal data remains with their individual account. Shared observance history remains visible to the household as part of the family's formation record. Prayer intentions previously shared with the household remain visible unless the departing member explicitly requests deletion.

If a household subscription is canceled, all household members retain read-only access to their historical shared data for 30 days, after which access ends. Individual accounts persist independently.

Household Data Cannot Be Shared Outside the Household

Household features are inherently within-family. We do not share household data with other households, dioceses, parishes, or any third parties without explicit consent. Aggregated, non-identifying household statistics (such as "average number of household members per subscription") may be used for internal analytics.

Adult Tagging Within Households

The Primary Subscriber can tag each Household member as Adult (18+) or Not yet an adult. This tagging enables access to Groups features (see Groups and Group Membership section below).

Adult Tagging relies on the honesty of the Primary Subscriber and is not independently verified by Domus. By tagging a Household member as Adult, the Primary Subscriber represents that the person is genuinely 18 years of age or older.

Adult Tagging status:

  • Is visible only to the Primary Subscriber
  • Can be changed at any time by the Primary Subscriber
  • Is not visible to other Household members or Group members
  • Does not affect access to Family features (prayer paths, family observances, prayer intentions within the Household)
  • Does affect access to Groups (only Adult-tagged members can create or join Groups)

Young Disciples (YDS) subscribers are inherently excluded from Groups regardless of Adult Tagging status.

4. Personal Practice Tracking (Fasting and Almsgiving)

The Fast and Give features of Domus provide daily invitations to intentional Catholic spiritual practice. Because these features involve tracking your personal spiritual life, this section describes how we handle that information.

What We Track

  • The dates on which you engaged with a Fast or Give invitation
  • Optional intentions you provide when offering a fast or gift
  • Your personal streak of consecutive days of participation
  • Historical patterns of your practice over time

Who Can See This Information

Only you. Personal practice tracking data is not shared with:

  • Other Household members (even those in your Family)
  • Members of Groups you belong to
  • Domus staff, except in specific cases described below

How We Use This Information

  • To display your personal streak and history within the app and web
  • To customize your daily experience within the Fast and Give tabs
  • To improve the app based on aggregated, de-identified usage patterns
  • For internal analysis of feature adoption and effectiveness

Aggregated Data

Domus may use aggregated statistics about Fast and Give participation to understand overall engagement (for example, "the percentage of subscribers who participated in Friday abstinence this week"). Individual practice data is never made identifiable in these aggregations.

When Domus Staff May Access Individual Data

  • To resolve a technical issue you have reported (such as a bug affecting streak calculation)
  • To fulfill a data request from you (such as data export)
  • As required by law

Your Controls

  • You can reset your personal streak at any time from the Account tab settings
  • You can request full deletion of your practice tracking history through the same interface
  • You can opt out of personal practice tracking entirely (Fast and Give features remain available for daily invitations, but tracking is disabled)

Fasting Is Not Medical Advice

Domus provides Fast invitations as spiritual formation resources, not as medical guidance. Fasting from food is not appropriate for everyone, particularly during pregnancy or nursing, serious illness or recovery, use of medications requiring regular food, eating disorder recovery, or other medically-indicated circumstances. Domus offers alternatives to physical fasting in every case and does not track or judge specific methods of participation.

Please consult your health provider before undertaking physical fasting.

5. Prayer Path Engagement and Personalization

We collect data about which prayer paths you engage with and when, in order to personalize your experience. Specifically:

What We Track

  • Path subscriptions: Which prayer paths you are subscribed to
  • Path engagement: Whether you have opened content from each path, and the date and time of that engagement
  • Feature engagement: Which features you use within the app and web experience

How We Use Engagement Data

  • Monthly Patronal Email personalization: Each subscriber's monthly email includes patronal blocks only for paths they engage with. We consider a path "engaged" if you are subscribed to it as your primary path (always included), or if you have opened content from that path within the last 30 days.
  • Household awareness features: Path engagement patterns power the household awareness features described above.
  • Service improvement: We use aggregated engagement data (not tied to individual users) to improve content, features, and user experience.

Your Controls

  • You can view your path subscriptions and change them at any time from your account
  • You can opt out of the monthly Patronal Email while remaining a subscriber
  • You can request deletion of your engagement history by contacting us

6. Groups and Group Membership

Groups are voluntary Catholic associations of adult subscribers who choose to walk together in prayer. When you create or join a Group, some information becomes shared within that Group. This section describes how we handle Group data.

Group Eligibility and Adult Status

Groups are restricted to subscribers who are 18 years of age or older. Adult status within a Household is determined by the Household's Primary Subscriber through Adult Tagging (see Family Features and Household Sharing section above).

Young Disciples (YDS) subscribers are excluded from Groups regardless of any other tagging or subscription status.

What Is Shared Within a Group

By default, other Group members can see:

  • Your name and profile photo
  • The paths you are subscribed to
  • Prayer intentions you post in the Group (visible with your attribution, unless you post anonymously)
  • Bulletin board posts you create in the Group (with your attribution)
  • Feast day observance participation (which observances you have marked as observed)
  • Engagement patterns within the Group (days you have opened the Group, observances you have marked)

What Is NOT Shared Within a Group

  • Your personal Prayer Path daily content
  • Your personal Fast or Give practice history or streaks
  • Your Household prayer intentions
  • Your personal notes on daily reflections
  • Your subscription payment information
  • Personal information about your children or non-adult Household members
  • Your engagement with paths outside of Group participation

Group Founders and Moderators

The person who creates a Group is the Group Founder. Founders have additional privileges within the Group:

  • Ability to invite new members via SMS code or QR code
  • Ability to remove members
  • Ability to change the Group's patron saint
  • Ability to change the Group's type (Men's, Women's, or Mixed)
  • Ability to delete the Group entirely

Domus does not treat Group Founders as agents of Domus. Group Founders are subscribers who have chosen to organize a Group, and their actions do not represent Domus policy.

Group Content Moderation

Domus reserves the right to review Group content in cases of reported policy violations or where required by law. Group content is not routinely monitored by Domus staff. Monitoring occurs only in response to specific reports or legal requirements.

Details on prohibited Group content are provided in our Terms of Service.

Group Discussion Guide Access

Groups flagged as Men's Group or Women's Group have access to the corresponding Iron & Altar or Vessel & Altar Small Group Discussion Guide in-app. Access to these guides is tied to Group type, not individual member subscription. Mixed Groups do not have Discussion Guide integration.

Group Data Retention

  • While a Group is active, all Group data is stored for member access
  • If a member leaves a Group, their historical contributions remain visible to remaining members unless they deleted them before leaving
  • If a Group is deleted by its Founder, Group data is permanently removed within 30 days
  • If a member is removed from a Group by the Founder, they lose access to Group data but their historical contributions remain visible to remaining members
  • If a Group Founder becomes inactive for 90 consecutive days, Domus may transfer Founder status to another Group member or, at Domus's discretion, disband the Group after appropriate notice

Members Leaving Groups

You may leave any Group at any time. Upon leaving:

  • You lose access to that Group's content
  • Your previous contributions remain visible to remaining Group members unless you deleted them before leaving
  • You can rejoin only if the Group Founder invites you again

Group Data Cannot Be Shared Outside the Group

Group features are inherently within-Group. We do not share Group data with other Groups, Households, dioceses, parishes, or third parties without explicit consent. Aggregated, non-identifying Group statistics may be used for internal analytics.

Small Group Subscription Payment Data

When a Small Group Subscription (Iron & Altar or Vessel & Altar) is purchased by a Small Group Founder, we collect and store standard subscription payment information for the Founder. Members joining via Small Group codes do not have separate payment information collected by Domus.

7. How We Use Your Information

We use the information we collect to:

  • Provide and maintain your subscriptions and access to our Services
  • Process payments and send transaction confirmations
  • Send you content and service-related communications (such as daily reflections, login links, and account notifications)
  • Send occasional cards, thank-you notes, or other physical correspondence
  • Respond to your inquiries and provide support
  • Provide Groups functionality (patron display, member visibility, intention sharing, bulletin boards)
  • Display personal practice tracking (Fasting and Almsgiving)
  • Enable Group Discussion Guide access for appropriate Group types
  • Facilitate Group invitation flows and Group member management
  • Enable Adult Tagging for access control to Groups
  • Improve our websites, content, and Services
  • Comply with legal obligations

8. How We Share Your Information

We do not sell, trade, or rent your personal information to third parties. We may share your information only in the following circumstances:

Service Providers. We share information with third-party companies that help us operate our Services, including our payment processor (Stripe) and email service provider. These providers are contractually obligated to protect your information and use it only for the purposes we specify.

Aggregated Data. We may share aggregated, non-personally-identifying usage data with parishes or dioceses to help them understand engagement within their faith communities. This data cannot be used to identify individual users or families. For example, a diocese might receive a report showing "47 families in your diocese used Hearth & Altar this month" without any information about which specific families.

Legal Requirements. We may disclose your information when required by law, court order, or governmental authority.

Business Transfers. In the event of a merger, acquisition, or sale of all or a portion of our assets, your information may be transferred as part of that transaction. We will notify you of any such change.

Household Members and Group Members

Certain features share your information within your household group (up to 6 family members) or within voluntary Groups you have joined. Details on Household sharing are described in the Family Features and Household Sharing section. Details on Group sharing are described in the Groups and Group Membership section. Sharing within these contexts is limited to those specific communities and does not include third parties.

9. What We Don't Do

  • We do not sell your personal information to third parties
  • We do not use third-party advertising trackers
  • We do not use your information for targeted advertising
  • We do not collect location data or personal browsing history outside our Services

10. Payment Processing

All payment information is processed securely by Stripe, Inc. We do not store your full credit card number on our servers. Your payment card details are collected and processed directly by Stripe. Stripe's privacy policy governs their use of your payment information. You can review it at stripe.com/privacy.

11. Cookies

We use essential cookies to maintain your login session and remember your preferences. These cookies are necessary for the Services to function. We do not use advertising or tracking cookies.

You can control cookies through your browser settings, though disabling cookies may affect your ability to use certain features of our Services.

12. Data Retention

We retain your personal information for as long as your account is active. If you cancel your subscription or your subscription expires, we retain your information so you can easily reactivate in the future and to maintain our relationship with you as part of our Catholic community. We may also retain and use your information to comply with legal obligations, resolve disputes, and enforce our agreements.

If you would like your data permanently deleted, please contact us at [email protected] and we will remove your information within 30 days, except where retention is required by law.

13. Data Security

We implement reasonable security measures to protect your personal information. All of our Services use SSL encryption for data transmission. However, no method of transmission over the internet or electronic storage is 100% secure, and we cannot guarantee absolute security. If you become aware of any unauthorized access to your account, please contact us immediately.

Household Data Protection

Household features involve shared data within a family group. We use appropriate technical measures to ensure household data is visible only to authorized household members and cannot be accessed by other households or third parties.

14. Your Rights and Choices

You have the right to:

  • Access the personal information we hold about you
  • Correct inaccurate information
  • Delete your personal information (we will process deletion requests within 30 days)
  • Reset your personal Fast or Give streak at any time
  • Delete individual Fast or Give history entries
  • Leave any Group at any time
  • Request full deletion of Group participation history
  • Change Adult Tagging status through your Household owner
  • Opt out of marketing communications at any time
  • Cancel your subscription at any time through your account page or by contacting us

To exercise any of these rights, please contact us at [email protected].

For California Residents

Under the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA), California residents have additional rights, including the right to know what personal information we collect, the right to request its deletion, and the right to opt out of the sale of personal information. We do not sell personal information. To submit a CCPA request, please contact us at [email protected].

For Residents of the European Economic Area

If you are located in the EEA, our legal bases for processing your information include your consent, the performance of our contract with you (your subscription), and our legitimate interests in operating and improving our Services. You have the right to lodge a complaint with your local data protection authority. Domus Formation is based in the United States, and your data will be transferred to and processed in the United States.

Monthly Patronal Email

Each Domus subscriber receives a Monthly Patronal Email on the 1st of each month. This email includes:

  • A monthly letter from Deacon Michael Halbrook
  • Introduction to the Church's monthly devotion
  • List of upcoming feasts for the month
  • Patronal blocks for the prayer paths you engage with

You may opt out of the Monthly Patronal Email at any time through your account settings while remaining an active subscriber. You may also opt out through the unsubscribe link in each email.

15. Children's Privacy

Most of our Services are intended for adults. Account registration and payment require users to be 18 years or older. Some of our Services include content designed for families with children, but account management is the responsibility of the parent or guardian.

We do not knowingly collect personal information directly from children under 13 without parental consent.

Young Disciples Society. Our Young Disciples Society property serves teenagers. In compliance with the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA):

  • We do not knowingly collect personal information from children under 13 without verifiable parental consent.
  • If we learn that we have collected personal information from a child under 13 without appropriate consent, we will delete that information promptly.
  • Parents or guardians may contact us to review, correct, or delete their child's personal information, or to withdraw consent for further collection.
  • YDS subscribers are excluded from Groups features regardless of any other tagging or subscription status. YDS is designed for teen use with age-appropriate privacy controls and cannot be used to enable adult-teen interaction.

Adult Tagging and Household Age Management. Household owners can tag Household members as Adult (18+) or Not yet an adult through the Family administration interface. This tagging enables Groups access for Adults and excludes non-Adults from Groups features. Tagging relies on the honesty of the Household owner and is not independently verified by Domus. Mis-tagging a minor as an Adult is a violation of these Terms and may result in restricted Groups access for the Household.

For users aged 13 to 17, we encourage parental involvement and collect only the minimum information necessary to participate in the service.

16. Third-Party Links

Our Services may contain links to third-party websites. This Privacy Policy does not apply to those sites, and we are not responsible for their privacy practices. We encourage you to review the privacy policy of any site you visit.

17. Changes to This Policy

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. We will notify you of changes by posting the updated policy on our websites and updating the "Last Updated" date above. For material changes, we may also notify you by email. Your continued use of our Services after such changes constitutes acceptance of the updated policy.

18. Contact Us

If you have questions about this Privacy Policy or our privacy practices, please contact us:

Domus Formation, Inc. PO Box 26 Edwardsville, IL 62025 Email: [email protected]

Domus Formation, Inc. Consecrated to the Sacred Heart of Jesus