Throughout the life of Sport for Business a cloud has hung over one of the joys of sport, the teaching of skills to young boys and girls and the helping of them along the sometimes difficult path towards adulthood.
Today for the first time we can write freely about the trial of Tom Humphries, a writer we once respected but who committed the most heinous of crimes and has damaged two girls and their families lives as well those of his own family and now more besides, albeit none in the fashion of the young girls he is known to have abused.
I am a coach. I have stood in the rain on the side of pitches from Derry to Kerry and pretty much every GAA club in Dublin.
I have played some small part in seeing six-year-olds unable to tie a lace turning into players that could thread a pass through the eye of a needle.
People sometimes marvel at the commitment of time and thought, care and patience that goes in at this level. Anyone who has been a coach would wear that lightly. It’s what we do and doesn’t make us better or worse than anyone else.
Understand
In many ways being a coach defines me better than any other aspect of my life. It has made me a better Father, helped me to understand the human condition in ways that might never have unfolded; taught me patience, resilience, empathy and many other attributes that I may have had within me but might never have been uncovered.
Above all, it has taught me the unequivocal importance of trust.
I would never pretend to know all the answers but I would trust myself to try and be honest, to do what I believe is best and to give others a chance to shine. It was done for me, I hope that some who I have helped will do the same.
The trust of a child is a gift more valued than gold, more in need of protection than anything else we have as a society.
Tom Humphries was also a coach. He betrayed the trust of a young girl, her teammates and her family. He crossed a line that is impossible to come back from.
Yesterday he was sentenced to two and a half years in jail.
Punishment
Much has already been said, by commentators wiser than I on the reasons for this criminally light level of punishment.
The girl herself had her childhood stolen. Her life was changed by the actions of Humphries and yet he will serve less time behind bars than three seasons of juvenile camogie. Less time than has elapsed since his actions were uncovered, less time than most right-thinking people would see as even close to being a judgment to fit the crime.
Last night Donal Og Cusack, who has seen the depths of despair that life choices can lead to did the honourable thing in resigning from the positions of authority he holds within sport, with the Clare Hurling team and as a director of Sport Ireland.
He did so because he recognised that in writing a character reference for a child abuser he in some ways lessened the horror of what Humphries had done. He is a thoughtful man, one of the most interesting I have had the pleasure to interview in sport.
In this he made a mistake and in resigning he has shown genuine contrition.
The other character referee David Walsh has said he condemns the actions of Humphries but he remains his friend.
No Sympathy
That quality of mercy would be well beyond me. Humphries crossed a line, knowingly and willingly, of his own free choice. He deserves no sympathy.
He has cast a cloud over that joy of coaching a child. No sympathy.
He has damaged a child forever. No sympathy.
He has ripped the gossamer thread that holds up the relationship between children and people in positions of trust. No sympathy.
In Ireland, we have seen the damage that crossing that line leaves in its wake.
How can we not be angry beyond words that someone like us, someone who understands sport, who can write with beauty about its power, abuse that power in such a way?
Wonder
On Saturday, on Sunday, on Monday night and last night, I stood on the side of a pitch, encouraging, laughing, occasionally becoming frustrated but never losing a sense of wonder at the joy the children on the pitch get from playing sport with friends.
Sport teaches us resilience. It bounces back. It has done in swimming and other sports where similar breaches of trust have destroyed lives.
It has done at St Vincents where Humphries coached and across clubs where Garda vetting is sometimes seen as a nuisance but must always remind us that the care of the kids is our first and sacrosanct responsibility as coaches.
It serves to make us ever more vigilant that others around us share the innocent pleasure of coaching for the same innocent reason as we do, to help others and to become better ourselves, as human beings, in so doing.
Because a judge has handed down a sentence we are now freer to write and talk about this case, hopefully so that it can’t happen again.
The lessons of history make that seem a touch utopian.
And yet we have to believe that we can make a difference, that we can never accept such wrong and that we always, always, always put the interest of the child first.
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Image Credit: Ulster GAA
