That might be true of the Vatican curia, with its silo mentality, but nearly all diocesan curias that I have come across are lean and mean because the falling congregations who provide the diocese's often stable or declining income have to contend with rising costs.
Portsmouth Diocese had a diocesan appeal for retired priests' accommodation some years ago and raised £13m of pledges in the Living Our Faith campaign, which concluded in June 2010.
Yet, at a quick glance the last audited diocesan accounts for the period ended 31 August 2011 show net current assets of just under £1m and net total assets of £63m, much of which is tied up in necessary church and other buildings and investments.
Projected negative cash flow of just over £4m was worrying and I am not surprised that with building maintenance expenditure on old buildings, etc, that Bishop Egan and his experienced financial secretary, Deacon Stephen Morgan, have forecast a current budget shortfall of £500k.
Something therefore needed to be done to rein in that budgeted deficit.
It is interesting to note that more than 50 per cent of the trustees of Portsmouth Diocese are priests, who are not normally renowned for managerial or financial competence.
As someone who has run a public company and worked for the Church, I would suggest to the bishop that diocesan curias are not at all like secular organisations or the civil service.
Strategic decision-making is very much in the hands of the bishop and his trustees, as Bishop Egan is now demonstrating.
Is Egan's tabloid style of headline-grabbing criticism of diocesan curia appropriate for a pastoral bishop?
Will a deficit reduction programme that leads to the removal of professional women with theological training from the curia staff and their substitution with already busy priests going to lead to 'Evangelistic Catholicism'?
No one would deny that by our baptism we all have Christ's mandate of evangelisation.
The big problems that our beloved Church has in retaining young Catholics after confirmation or gaining new followers of Christ is not just materialism.
It is also the gross mishandling and cover-ups associated with the recent paedophile scandals, the declining numbers of priests, and the unaccountability of the ordained to their congregations.