Welcome to The Light, your quiet hour of reflection.
In the cornfields of Dyersville, Iowa, something unexpected unfolded Sunday night. Scott Stapp of Creed paused mid-concert before thousands of festival-goers and turned a rock performance into a moment of communal worship. Whatever one believes, there is something quietly remarkable about a crowd gathered for nostalgia suddenly confronted with invitation.
From that field, we move to a different kind of threshold. A memorial plaque has been unveiled at Auschwitz honoring Jane Haining, a Scottish missionary who refused to abandon the Jewish children in her care even as danger closed around her. She died there in nineteen forty-four. Some lives are remembered not for what they achieved, but for what they refused to surrender.
And in a Massachusetts courtroom, the trial of Lindsay Clancy has stirred something uncomfortable in our public conversation. Three jurors who voted to convict have faced criticism for disparaging the one holdout who would not. Wherever one stands on the verdict, the spectacle of a deliberating conscience being publicly shamed asks us something worth sitting with about mercy, judgment, and the weight we place on both.
That is this hour's reflection. Carry the light gently.
