I want to say something about the importance of Holy Cross, not just what it is, but what it stands for. I don’t think a person can really live a moral life without hoping that God loves us enough to die for us and wants us to love each other the same way. The only way we can show that we want to live up to that idea together is by attending the Holy Communion and symbolizing that we want to be united in Jesus’s sacrifice. Everybody in the world should be doing that together. I think that’s what Holy Cross stands for.
What do we do about the fact that 95% of the people in Weare, or in N.H., or in the world, don’t think it’s important to be in church together with all of their neighbors every Sunday? That’s true today, and it will probably still be true in 100 years or 1000. When I go off to college and can do what I want, the question for me is going
to be whether there’s any point going to church every Sunday to show that I want to be part of something that only makes sense if it includes everybody, when almost nobody else seems to care about being part of it. When we come here every Sunday, we’re waiting for the rest of the community to join us, even though we’re almost sure they’ll never come. It’s like voting for the only good candidate when everybody says he’s unelectable. You’ll probably be disappointed, but the only way to ever elect such a candidate is if everybody does what they think is right rather than what is popular. The unity we hope for when we come here every Sunday is so important that it’s worth sticking with for our whole lives even if nobody else ever comes.