Rainbows Over Ireland

Tara Hill

Newgrange

Connemara

Skellig Michael (in the distance)

A castle near Cashel

Croagh Patrick

Glendalough

Clonmacnoise

Dublin
(photo from here)

My kind, loathed and despised pariahs that we've always been down through the ages, won a huge historic victory today in Ireland.

Ireland voted to legalize marriage equality by what appears will be a large margin.  This is the first time ever that marriage equality became the law of the land by referendum.  The turnout for the vote was enormous adding to size and magnitude of the victory.  I expect that this vote signals a sea change for far more than just Ireland.
The Yes forces carried out a brilliant campaign that mobilized thousands of volunteers and really turned out the vote.

This vote is also a stunning rebuke to the Roman Catholic Church in Ireland, once an all-powerful institution in that country.  I wonder if this vote would even have come to pass if the Catholic Church's long record of crime against women and children in Ireland had not come to light.  The Catholic hierarchs could not have possibly been handed a more stinging rebuke to their claims of moral authority.  "Bishops who live in glass cathedrals should not throw stones" said one commentator.

And now the most authentic moral voice in Ireland belongs not to an elderly hierarch wearing a cassock and pectoral cross, but to a drag star wearing a wig and heels named Panti Bliss.  Unlike certain ecclesiastic Pharisees, Panti (and so many like her) really did walk that Via Dolorosa (some all the way to its fatal end).

I'm about as Irish as sauerbraten or cassoulet, but I couldn't be prouder of the Irish, or more grateful to them.

EXTRA:

It's official!  Yes wins with 62% in the highest voter turnout for an Irish election in 20 years.