To the Editor:

What is our problem? How can people like us, usually so successful in our personal financial dealings, act so incompetently when working together? How could the Archdiocese speed to the brink of institutional bankruptcy and collapse? Was nobody watchful at the helm? Were no statistics gathered and studied? Were there no analysts monitoring the course and informing the decision-makers? Was some kind of neuroleptic potion ingested that rendered all the players fractious and delusional?

Certain connections exist between, on the one hand, our group foibles and, on the other hand, the catastrophe that is about to knock down our communities’ material achievements of the last hundred years, and with them much of our ability to carry on with implanting our sacred heritage. We are not the victims of circumstances; we are its creators.

Let us hope that our new Archbishop, Elpidophoros, will live up to his name (“Carrier of Hope”) and guide us by identifying and helping to minimize those of our characteristics which, if left untreated, will continue paving our way to collective failure.

John J. Yiannias

Charlottesville, VA