Dublin Archbishop Diarmuid Martin Responds to Pantigate Controversy: "Anybody Who Doesn’t Show Love Towards Gay and Lesbian People Is insulting God"

The archbishop takes sides with the drag queen.

That's how Fred Clark (Slacktivist) sums up* the recent comments of Dublin archbishop Diarmuid Martin on Irish national television RTÉ about what's being called the Pantigate controversy. Martin said,

God never created anybody that he doesn’t love. … Anybody who doesn’t show love towards gay and lesbian people is insulting God. They are not just homophobic if they do that – they are actually Godophobic because God loves every one of those people. … Certainly the sort of actions that we heard of this week of people being spat at because they were gay or ridiculed … that is not a Christian attitude. We have to have the courage to stand up and say that. … We all belong to one another and there is no way we can build up a society in which people are excluded or insulted. We have to learn a new way in Ireland to live with our differences and for all of us to live with respect for one another.

In a previous Slacktivist posting, Fred Clark discusses the Pantigate controversy, as does Dan Savage in his typical salty way at his SLOG site (Did I say that Dan Savage can be salty? Be forewarned if that matters to you). As Savage points out, Rory O'Neill, who performs in drag as Panti Bliss,  went on RTÉ on 11 January to talk about homophobia in Ireland, and when he called Irish homophobes the homophobes that they are, the homophobes went ballistic.

RTÉ then immediately made a big payout to those that O'Neill named, including Iona Institute, which blogger Jeremy Hooper characterizes as "basically the National Organization for Marriage of Ireland." As Irish journalist Kathy Sheridan has noted, the Iona Institute is "blessed with extremely high-profile members with priceless multimedia platforms," and "is said to be 'very, very engaged' with politicians."

It was in response to RTÉ's appeasement of the homophobes and its implicit scapegoating of Rory O'Neill that Panti Bliss made the following stellar statements about Irish homophobia at Dublin's historic Abbey Theatre--to which Diarmuid Martin is responding:

I highly encourage you to take the time to listen to the entire video. 

I suppose the kind of Catholicism that Bill Donohue wants Catholics in the developed nations to "catch up with" is the kind that spits at and mocks those who are gay? Since Mr. Donohue specifically  states that Catholics in the developed part of the world need to "catch up with" African Catholics, it must be the kind of Catholicism that encourages the beating of people who are gay by state officials, when states pass laws outlawing homosexuality?

Just wondering.

*Fred Clark's comment is on the main page of his Slacktivist blog. You won't see it when you click on the posting to which the link points.