Here are the speeches from the recent Limerick meeting against the proposed Irish blasphemy law, courtesy of Limerick Blogger.
Michael Nugent, Atheist Ireland, and Larry Maher, Midwest Humanists
Blasphemy is a Victimless Crime from Limerick Blogger on Vimeo.
I have trouble understanding how the Catholic church still acts as if it is the voice of moral authority. Look at what good Catholic priests and nuns did in Ireland for decades. Look at what many good Catholic priests did to children in the USA. Look at the fact that bishops and archbishops did virtually nothing to stop the abuses in either country. Look at the fact that for decades the Catholic church leadership including Popes promoted and encouraged virulent anti-Semitism. The Catholic church has blood on its hands regarding the Holocaust. So maybe someone can say why the church still acts holier than thou?
Comment by Wyman — June 18, 2009 @ 6:40 am
So now that there’s going to be another referendum on the Lisbon Treaty in October, there’s no reason why we can’t also have a referendum to remove the blasphemy provision from the Constitution, right?
Let’s see if Dermot Ahern really is committed to a pluralist democratic society or whether he’s just using the Constitution as a figleaf for his reactionary tendencies.
Comment by Woesinger — June 19, 2009 @ 10:49 am
I think that the Dermot Ahern “initiative” was probably an attempt at either a smoke screen for other issues in the election or a wasted attempt to get religious people to vote for FF.
It is a dangerous area to be interfering with and I would hope that the government will come up with sensitive wording that would allow for it to be included during the Lisbon referendum and remove this threat to liberty and free speech from our constitution. The worst thing would be if he managed to position it in such a way as to deliberately mislead people into thinking ridiculous things, as happened with the original Lisbon treaty. The consequences of having the Blasphemy bill passed into law would effectively put Ireland back into the dark ages and we would be the laughing stock of the free world. If we are not already.
Comment by Irish_Bright — June 21, 2009 @ 2:28 pm