IN 1979, when Pope John Paul II visited the Republic of Ireland, 1.2m people attended his open-air mass in Phoenix Park in Dublin—more than a third of the population of the country at that time. As many again turned up at other smaller venues.
Four years later Catholic clergy and lay groups held back the tide of social reform sweeping across much of the rest of Europe by getting two-thirds of voters to back the eighth amendment to the constitution, banning abortion in any circumstances, including rape, incest and even an imminent threat to the life of the mother. Three years after that, in 1986, the same religious coalition persuaded 63% of voters to retain a constitutional ban on divorce.
By then, though, the power of the church had already passed its zenith. In 1985 the sale of condoms, previously tightly restricted, was liberalised despite the church’s best efforts. Divorce was permitted in 1995.
In 2012 Savita Halappanavar, a 31-year-old dentist, died of septic...Continue reading
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