It was fitting, a couple of days before Christmas on the shortest day of the year, for Helenans to gather in the cold to remember the homeless among us.

After all, as Christians prepared to celebrate the birth of Christ, a baby bereft of the comforts of home and reduced to sleeping in a feeding trough, how better to honor the spirit of the holiday?

The event Thursday on the Capitol steps was arranged by the Montana Council on Homelessness to commemorate National Homeless Persons’ Memorial Day. It also honored the memory of four homeless people who died this year in Helena.

Homelessness is nothing new. There always have been people who fall through the cracks, who because of illness or mental problems or job loss or a simple inability to cope find themselves with no roof over their heads. But as social safety nets seem to shrink, the number grow.

A survey last January found 2,311 homeless people in Montana, ranging from infants to veterans of the Korean War. A third of them suffered from mental or physical disabilities. A quarter of them had been without a place to call home for a year or more. Not a few held a job — just not a job good enough to pay for both food and rent. During Thursday’s ceremony, Lt. Gov. John Bohlinger, co-chairman of the council and no slouch in the caring department, said the homeless too often are an “ugliness we have a difficult time facing.” And he was right — how else to explain their continual presence, seen but not seen, staring from outside a window at a Christmas Even they cannot enjoy?

Actually, there were only about 50 people who joined Thursday’s chilly memorial. But if their gathering helped raise our awareness of the plight of the homeless, well, that’s a pretty good Christmas present, don’t you think?