Welcome to The Light, your quiet-hour reflection.
The Supreme Court moved this week in shadow, not in sunlight. Through its so-called shadow docket, the Court's Republican-appointed justices allowed the Trump administration to advance restrictions on mail-in voting, lifting an injunction without the slow deliberation that truth, and democracy, deserve. When courts stop looking clearly, we all lose something.
From the courts of law to the courts of silicon, we turn to a quieter reckoning. Artificial intelligence's thirst for water, drawn through the cooling towers of massive data centers, is real, though modest compared to agriculture or manufacturing. Still, in regions already straining under drought, even modest can mean too much, and better cooling technologies remain an urgent, answerable question.
And in Redding, California, a gentler story. Bill Johnson, senior leader of Bethel Church, has married Linda Francoeur, four years after losing his wife Beni to cancer. Grief has its seasons, and so does the heart's willingness to open again. There is something quietly brave in that.
That's this hour's reflection. Carry the light gently.
