![The Foster family in January 1988. From left: Emma, 6, Aimee, 2, Chrissie, Katie, 4, and Anthony.](http://web.archive.org./web/20170615145438im_/https://www.fairfaxstatic.com.au/content/dam/images/g/w/e/e/w/h/image.related.articleLeadNarrow.300x0.gwo1hb.png/1497111661534.jpg)
In recent days, a great Australian man was farewelled, some of the most despicable Australian men were prevented from leaving our land and a disgraced Melbourne (former) teacher who induced his nine-year-old students to massage him and told them tales of incest, violence and cruelty lost his ridiculous case for unfair dismissal in the Fair Work Commission.
All stories involve the abuse or unacceptable treatment of children. I'll return to that momentarily.
First, though, a broader context. We spend a hell – I use the word advisedly, for reasons that will become apparent – of a lot of time in the pursuit of happiness. The underlying assumption is that happiness is a goal so unimpeachable as to be pre-eminent. An entire industry has developed around the "science of happiness", with coaches and psychologists and facilitators and gurus guiding the guileless and the grasping.
Is such an unquestioning expectation a mistake? Is happiness perhaps not as reliable as we might believe? Is happiness a slightly flimsy, shallow notion? Might it not be better to seek something a little more solid? Happiness is closely associated with satisfying desire, with attaining pleasure. A better notion, surely, is contentment, which is related to happiness, but is more about being satisfied within realistic parameters, and not being rendered miserable by unmet, unrealistic or unjustified material and self-indulgent desires.
Anthony Foster's life – which ended shockingly a few weeks ago when he collapsed, hit his head and was soon gone at only 64 – knew more sadness and pain than anyone should ever have to contemplate. His state funeral in Melbourne this week was a wrenching event for the many hundreds attending and the many thousands more who followed it live. And it was an acknowledgement of the historic, monumental contribution Foster made to this nation. The efforts and sheer guts and decency he and his wife Chrissie showed for almost two decades were instrumental in raising the awareness and community unhappiness that led to the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse, which in coming months, and after four years of hearings, will deliver its report and make its recommendations.
Significantly, the head of that commission, Justice Peter McClellan, asked to speak at Foster's funeral. Justice McClellan set the nation, particularly our legislators, a compelling challenge; the commission's report will contain recommendations designed to prevent any more children being raped or otherwise abused.
Justice McClellan knew Foster well. The Fosters had been to as many of the commission hearings as possible, providing succour and comfort to victims and survivors. They had three daughters. Two, Emma and Katie, were repeatedly abused at primary school by paedophile priest Kevin O'Donnell. Emma later died. Katie is permanently in a wheelchair after being hit by a car. Katie and Aimee stood and spoke and all could see the calibre with which they were endowed.
 Chrissie Foster, with ABC journalist Paul Kennedy, wrote a 2010 book, Hell on the Way to Heaven, about the Foster family's experience, including the inexcusably cold and inert treatment they received from the Catholic Church, then led by Archbishop George Pell, now a cardinal and the third most senior member of the Catholic hierarchy.
One of the people at Foster's non-religious funeral was another anti-paedophile campaigner, former journalist Senator Derryn Hinch. He was a driving force behind world-first laws that will strip the passports of registered sex offenders. This is to stop them from travelling overseas, particularly to south-east Asia, to rape children.
While the Catholic Church has been shown by manifold testimony at the royal commission to have spent more time, effort and money protecting paedophiles than preventing child rape, an organisation that works in Cambodia and elsewhere, Hagar, specialises in rescuing children and women, one by one, from slavery, including sex slavery.
The genesis of Australia's move against these peripatetic paedophiles shows how momentous things can be serendipitously triggered. Hagar Australia's patron, actor and activist Rachel Griffiths, sent Hinch a handwritten note soon after he was elected last year. It read, among other things:Â "If we can take a passport off a bankrupt, why can't we stop our paedophiles travelling to Myanmar?"
Only a few months later, we are poised for what Justice Minister Michael Keenan says is "the strongest crackdown on child-sex tourism ever". Sadly, such expedition was lacking in the case of Melbourne man Chris Adams, who was finally sacked by the Department of Education earlier this year, having been suspended from Caulfield Junior College in late 2015 amid complaints by several parents about his treatment of their children.  The industry watchdog, the Victorian Institute of Teaching, has been even tardier. Adams remains registered, which means that although he can not teach in a public school, he could be employed by an independent or Catholic school.
In recent days, too, we've had research about where to find the world's happiest workers. The World Happiness Report 2017, which examined the relationship between work and wellbeing, drawing on data from 150 countries. Here's the formula: 1. A high-paid, white collar job. 2. Sufficient time to frolic outside of work. 3. Variety. Yeah, maybe.
Perhaps we should add a fourth; enlightened self-interest. By which I mean that those who seek to fix wrongs and protect rights get more out of their engagement than they expend. Perhaps they are the richest among us, people who have found meaning, purpose and maybe even some contentment – and sometimes even in the face of profound unhappiness.
Michael Short is The Age's chief editorial writer. @shortmsgs Â
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