The fact of the matter is we've seen a remarkable change in how we treat mentally ill people. I think much of that has been positive, but we also see where people are falling through the cracks in the system. We see it in the increasing number of homeless people in our streets, we see it with these kinds of tragic incidents, and I think as a community we need to understand that when somebody has been identified with having a mental illness we need to have a better system in place of community-based facilities than what we have now. I think the facilities we have do a good job, but I think they're underfunded and cannot serve the population we're forcing on them by closing mental institutions. Sister Rita Yeasted, an English professor at La Roche College, said churches also must take the lead in making society kinder.
Churches can change that.
Yeasted said one clear lesson from Baumhammers' carnage is that violence is everybody's problem because it happens everywhere, including upscale suburbs. I was in my office on Friday night listening to the reports. I heard it was two dead, then three. When I got home, five were gone. But the fact is violence and craziness extend to every community.