Eventide & Altar

The criterion for protection in Ezekiel's vision is striking: those who are marked for safety are the ones who mourn and groan over the abominations - those who have not become numb. The glory departs from those who have stopped grieving over what is wrong. The capacity for grief is what keeps them in the presence of the holy.

Clare of Assisi spent forty years choosing to be small. She could have been large by the world's measure - she came from wealth and position and possibility. She chose radical poverty and stayed in it long enough to know it as freedom. She died without losing the joy. That combination - poverty and joy, smallness and freedom - is what her feast offers.

Jesus puts a child in the middle of the greatness debate. Not to say the child will win the debate. To say the child is the debate's answer. Whoever becomes humble like this child is greatest. The people arguing about rank are looking in exactly the wrong direction.

The little ones have angels who always look on the face of the Father. That sentence carries particular weight at the end of a long life, when you have known your share of little ones - children who grew up, grandchildren who are still small, people who came through your care at vulnerable moments. Every one of them watched. Every one held in the Father's direct attention.

The ninety-nine are good and safe and staying put. But the one who has gone astray gets the shepherd leaving everything. There may be someone in your life for whom that is the prayer tonight.

The Sorrowful Mysteries. The suffering of the one who became small for us - who did not grasp at greatness but emptied himself, as Paul says in Philippians. Pray them for the little ones: those in your care who are still small, and those who have strayed and are being searched for.

• For the capacity to grieve what is wrong rather than becoming numb - for the mark Ezekiel describes, which is the mark of someone still paying attention, we pray to the Lord.
• For those who are the strayed one tonight - far from the flock, perhaps not sure they will be searched for - that the shepherd is already on his way, we pray to the Lord.
• On the feast of Saint Clare, for the communities of the Poor Clares and for all who have chosen radical smallness for the kingdom, we pray to the Lord.

Name the strayed one you carry tonight - not abstractly, but the specific person who has gone out from the ninety-nine. Hold them before the Father who will not let them be lost if it can be helped. The shepherd goes. That is the shape of the promise.