National Coming Out Day—October 11—seems to have lost most of its cache in recent years.

That’s probably due to a number of reasons—for one, the organization that took it over years ago, the Human Rights Campaign, doesn’t seem to want to promote it that much anymore. There was a time when National Coming Out Day events would be held in cities across the country, generating not only widespread participation but lots of publicity for GLBT rights as well. There’s hardly a ripple, let alone a splash, being generated this year.

Second, some say National Coming Out Day has lost its appeal because, well, so many more of us are out now than once was the case. That may be true, though the Larry Craigs of the world show that we still have a ways to go. And in small towns, even in large ones, it’s still hard to come out in many situations. Witness the youths right here in Chicago who flock to Boystown at night so they can be out, even though it means, because they’re too young and there are too few youth services, that they can only be out on the street and not in the clubs. At least they can walk the sidewalks and hold hands, they say, which is far more than they can do—and still be safe—in their own neighborhoods.

Maybe we need to think of National Coming Out Day as having a little more meaning than just saying, “I’m gay.” Maybe we need to look at coming out as more of a step into a community than just a step out of the closet, as a commitment not just to ourselves but to others as well.

In recent weeks we’ve seen something like that played out in Washington, where there was a much publicized attempt to cut gender identity out of the pending federal Employment Non-Discrimination Act. Some of the bill’s backers—a distinct minority, we now know—thought it would be easier to pass the bill if it covered just gays and lesbians, not transgenders, too.

No way, said gays, lesbians and transgenders all over the country, with one very loud, passionate voice. It’s all of us or none if us, most of our community said.

No one really knew before how committed gays and lesbians were to transgender rights. They know now. In a sense, it was a coming out, a spontaneous and heartfelt response that said, “Each of us is fully committed to fighting for all of us. We will not leave any of our brothers and sisters behind.”

That’s the kind of “coming out” that we need to keep in mind every day as we continue to build what is, in reality, a very young community, one that only came into self-conscious being in the last 50 years or so.

Yes, we all have our individual lives and unique interests. Yes, we come from different backgrounds and pursue happiness in thousands of ways. But when we say, “I’m gay,” or “I’m lesbian, or “I’m bisexual” or “I’m transgendered,” we are making a statement that has a communal implication. It may say, “I am an individual and I must be myself,” but it also says, “I am a part of this community,” a powerful, unequivocal expression that straight people never have the opportunity to make. It is both self-assertive and inclusive at the same time.

So on this National Coming Out Day, think out of the box a bit, of how being yourself makes you a part of all of us, and what that means for our community. Coming out, after all, should be more than just a step away from the closet. To paraphrase George Fox, it should mean setting your light “upon a table in a candlestick,” so all the world—and your community—can see a little better.