The ark is wherever human beings come together because in their heart of hearts all of them — white and black, believer and unbeliever, hippie and square — dream the same dream, which is a dream of peace — peace between the nations, between the races, between the brothers — and thus ultimately a dream of love. Love is not an excuse for the mushy and innocuous, but love as a summons to battle against all that is unlovely and unloving in the world. The ark, in other words, is where we have each other and where we have hope.
— Frederick Buechner, Secrets in the Dark