Welcome to The Light, your quiet hour of reflection.
A Catholic publication found itself at the center of a theological storm this week, after publishing an op-ed inviting readers to honor Transgender History Month by praying to saints the author described as transgender. The backlash was swift, and the conversation it opened — about identity, tradition, and who belongs inside sacred story — is one that shows no sign of quieting.
From questions of the soul, we turn to questions of the body. Biohackers across the internet have been self-administering metformin, a diabetes medication, convinced it holds the key to slowing human aging. Scientists are urging caution. The difference between a promising compound and a proven one, they remind us, is precisely the rigor that a one-person trial cannot provide.
And then there is Bruce Springsteen, speaking with rare openness about his long acquaintance with depression — that low hum, as Maria Popova describes it, that swells until it drowns the symphony of life. Springsteen offers something modest and hard-won: if you can acknowledge the darkness, and soften toward it rather than fight it, very often it passes more gently.
That's this hour's reflection. Carry the light gently.
