Welcome to The Light, your quiet hour of reflection.
There is something quietly profound in new research out of Nautilus, which finds that when caregivers share saliva with infants — through a spoon, a kiss, a bite of food — babies read that exchange as a signal of deep belonging. Saliva, it seems, is a language of closeness, teaching the very young who their people are.
From that most intimate of bonds, we turn to something equally tender. The Vatican's Santa Marta Pediatric Dispensary marked World Sight Day by offering free eye screenings and prescription glasses to children in need — a small, careful act of restoration, giving young eyes the chance to see the world as it truly is.
And in Rome, Pope Leo the Fourteenth gathered pastoral leaders to mark a decade since Amoris Laetitia. Cardinal Neri Ferrão brought voices from Asia, while scholar Vincenzo Rosito raised the quiet urgency of our digital age — asking how families hold their children gently when screens reshape the very nature of growing up.
That is this hour's reflection. Carry the light gently.
