接納同性婚姻的愛爾蘭與天主教會漸行漸遠

DUBLIN — The morning after Ireland learned it had become the first nation to approve same-sex marriage by Popular vote, Diarmuid Martin, the archbishop of Dublin, looked out at the future of the Roman Catholic church.

都柏林——愛爾蘭成爲世界上首個通過全民投票將同性婚姻合法化的國家，次日清晨，都柏林總主教迪亞姆德·馬丁 (Diarmuid Martin)思索着羅馬天主教的未來在何方。

It could be found at St. Mary’s Pro-Cathedral here, in downtown Dublin, as two rows of children awaited confirmation before him in the lofty, column-lined church.

這個未來也許就在都柏林市中心的聖瑪利亞臨時主教座堂(St. Mary’s Pro-Cathedral)裏。孩子們正分列兩排，在高大威嚴、立柱高聳的教堂裏等待領受總主教的堅振聖事。

“Boys and girls, I made my confirmation 60 years ago,” he told them, adding, “Your world is different from mine.”

“男孩們、女孩們，我是六十年前領受堅振的，”總主教告訴他們，接着又說，“你們的世界和我的不同。”

Not far away, the streets were quiet after a long night of celebrating. Revelers filled the bars, beeped horns, waved rainbow flags and drank Guinness after the result was announced on Saturday. The size of the victory energized supporters, with the referendum affirmed by 62 percent of the electorate and passed in all but one of Ireland’s 43 districts.

不遠處，整夜歡慶後的街道十分安靜。週六投票結果公佈後，歡慶的人擠滿了酒吧，把喇叭按得嗶嗶作響，揮舞着彩虹旗，暢飲吉尼斯黑啤。這次的大勝讓人興奮不已，62%的選民投了贊成票，愛爾蘭的43個區除一個區外都同意同性戀婚姻合法化。

After the votes were counted, the carefully planned and executed campaign by activist groups seemed as much about putting behind a past entrenched in theocracy and tradition as it was about marriage for gays and lesbians. And it underscored how different Ireland is today for the young, who turned out in droves to vote. In a little more than a generation, Ireland has both distanced itself from the church and sharpened its secular identity.

計票結束後再來看待這場由活動人士精心計劃並實施的運動，它的目標除了爭取同性婚姻，似乎還要將一個與神權和傳統密不可分的過去拋諸腦後。對於成羣前去投票的年輕人來說，結果也凸顯瞭如今的愛爾蘭有多麼不同。不過一個世代多一點的時間，愛爾蘭不僅與教會疏遠了，還強化了自己的世俗身份。

At St. Mary’s, the results of the referendum, as one might expect, did not come up — the archbishop instead quipped about his first experience with a cellphone. But afterward, speaking at a house next to the church, he conceded that much had changed.

如人所料，投票結果並未在聖瑪麗教堂被提及——總主教反倒是打趣談起自己第一次用手機的情形。但事後在教堂附近的一棟房子裏發言時，他承認許多事情已經改變了。

“The church needs to take a reality check,” Archbishop Martin said after the Mass, repeating a comment he had made Saturday. “It’s very clear there’s a growing gap between Irish young people and the church, and there’s a growing gap between the culture of Ireland that’s developing and the church.”

“教會需要認清現實，”馬丁總主教在彌撒後重申了他在週六做出的評論。“很明顯，愛爾蘭年輕人和教會的隔閡越來越大，處在發展中的愛爾蘭文化和教會之間的隔閡也越來越大。”

The country’s cultural evolution reflects a blend of disaffection with the church, and Ireland’s willingness to embrace a wider vision of itself in the world. As the church lost many people in its scandals and its unwillingness to yield to sexual freedoms, the European Union found itself with a willing and eager member.

愛爾蘭文化的演變既體現了人們對教會的不滿，也表達了愛爾蘭人希望能與世界更緊密聯繫的意願。由於醜聞和對於性開放的不妥協態度，教會失去了很多支持者，而歐盟因此獲得了一個主動且熱切的成員國。

The shift didn’t happen overnight. After Ireland broke from Britain in 1922, it was a virtual colony to the Vatican, a theocracy in all but name.

但改變並不是一夜間發生的。愛爾蘭在1922年脫離英國後幾乎就是梵蒂岡(Vatican)的殖民地，本質上施行神權統治。

John Charles McQuaid, the longtime archbishop of Dublin, played a central role in drafting Ireland’s Constitution before he became archbishop, hewing to conservative church doctrine and closely involving himself in details as small as the placement of commas in the document. That kind of unchecked dominance by the church continued for decades.

在成爲總主教前，曾在位多年的都柏林總主教約翰·查爾斯·麥誇伊德(John Charles McQuaid)在《愛爾蘭憲法》的起草過程中扮演了關鍵角色，在其中貫徹了保守教義，連哪裏加逗號之類的細節都親自過問。這種無以制衡的教會統治持續了數十年。

In 1979, more than one million people turned out for Pope John Paul II’s visit to Dublin, a staggering crowd in a country with a population of about 3.4 million at the time. In 1983, by a two-thirds majority, Ireland hewed to church teachings and passed a referendum outlawing abortion except in cases where a mother’s life was at risk, after a divisive campaign.

1979年，教皇約翰·保羅二世(John Paul II)訪問都柏林，一百多萬人前往瞻仰。對於一個當時只有約340萬人口的國家來說，這個數量是驚人的。1983年，經過一場導致分歧的遊說運動後，愛爾蘭依循教義，以三分二多數投票通過立法禁止墮胎，只有產婦有生命危險時才能例外。

But signs of resistance had already been showing. In 1971, women’s rights activists organized a “condom train,” going over the border to Belfast and bringing back condoms to a country that outlawed contraception.

但抵抗的跡象已經顯現。1971年婦女權利倡導者們組織了一輛“避孕套列車”，穿越邊境去貝爾法斯特，讓避孕套回到這個視節育爲非法的國家。

Tony Flannery, a priest who was suspended in 2012 because of his criticism of the church’s views on women and homosexuality, said contraception was a seminal issue for a generation that became the parents of today’s youngest voters.

2012年，神父託尼·弗蘭納裏(Tony Flannery)因批評教會關於女性和同性戀的觀點而被停職，他認爲避孕對於一代人來說是一個重大的問題，而今天投票的年輕人則是那一代人的子女。

And it “was the first time that Irish Catholics first questioned church teaching,” Mr. Flannery said. “That opened the door, and after that they increasingly began to question a whole raft of Catholic sexual teaching, and then the child sexual abuse scandal came along which destroyed church credibility in the whole area of sexuality.”

“這是愛爾蘭天主教徒第一次質疑教會的教義”，弗蘭納裏說道。“這開啓了一扇門，至此以後教徒們越來越多地開始天主教在性方面的教義產生全面質疑，之後又發生了兒童性侵醜聞，徹底摧毀了教會在這方面的威信。

Even the reputation of Archbishop McQuaid, who died in 1973 after more than three decades at the helm of the Dublin archdiocese, crumbled in the tide of child sex scandals. In 2009, his role in covering up abuse was excoriated in a report commissioned by the Irish government and the headline of a commentary in The Irish Times likened him to Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. By 2011, abuse allegations surfaced involving him.

甚至連麥誇伊德總主教的聲譽都在那一系列醜聞中崩塌了。在執掌都柏林總教區三十多年後，麥誇伊德於1973年逝世。2009年，愛爾蘭政府發佈了一份報告，嚴厲譴責麥誇伊德掩蓋性醜聞的行爲，而《愛爾蘭時報》(The Irish Times)的一篇評論文章在標題中把他比作阿亞圖拉魯霍拉·霍梅尼(Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini)。到了2011年，涉及麥誇伊德本人的性侵醜聞也浮出水面。

“The people have changed their relationship with the Catholic Church because they’ve been disappointed and let down,” said Christina Breen, 54, who visited Dublin Castle on Saturday to see the results of the vote, a show of support because one of her sons is gay.

“人民已經改變了他們同天主教會的關係，因爲他們深感失望，”54歲的克里斯蒂娜·布林(Christina Breen)說到。週六，克里斯蒂娜來到都柏林城堡查看公投的結果，這是一種支持的表示，因爲她的其中一個兒子是同性戀者。

Or, as Mr. Flannery put it, “The day when the church had the power to influence social debate in Ireland, or to swing it, is gone.”

或者如弗蘭納裏所說，“教會有能力影響或者動搖愛爾蘭社會辯論的日子已經過去。”

The legal system began to chip away at the laws restricting homosexuals. In 1988, a lawyer named Mary Robinson successfully argued a case in the European court system challenging Ireland’s law that made homosexuality a crime. Five years later, after Ms. Robinson became Ireland’s first female president in 1990, she signed a law decriminalizing homosexuality.

法律制度開始瓦解那些制約同性戀的法律。1988年，一位名爲瑪麗·羅賓遜(Mary Robinson)的律師在歐洲法庭制度下做出了成功抗辯，向將同性戀定爲犯罪行爲的愛爾蘭法律發起了挑戰。五年後，也就是羅賓遜成爲愛爾蘭第一任女性總統五年後，她簽署了一部將同性戀非罪化的法律。

At the same time that the church’s moral authority was flagging, the Irish were finding a new identity within the European Union. They share the euro, and are more willing to take advantage of low-cost airfares for weekend jaunts to the Continent and beyond, broadening an outlook that for their parents and grandparents had been molded by the church and Britain.

在教會道德權威衰落的同時，愛爾蘭人在歐盟中找到了新的身份。他們和其他國家一起使用歐元，更願意利用廉價機票到歐洲大陸以及更遠的地方進行週末遠足，開拓眼界，不像他們的父母、祖父母輩那樣深受教會和英國的影響。

Even as it widely celebrates the change that the same-sex marriage vote indicated, Ireland is not entirely beyond the kind of cultural battles that have led to far more contentious political campaigns in the past. Many believe there will be a much more fierce cultural debate over legalizing abortion.

正當大批民衆歡慶同性婚姻公投意味着的變革之際，愛爾蘭仍存在着文化鬥爭，這類鬥爭在過去引發了許多具有爭議的政治活動。很多人相信，未來有關墮胎合法化的文化辯論將會更多、更激烈。

With the vote for the same-sex referendum going nearly two to one in favor, Archbishop Martin said Sunday that the church needed what he called “a new language that will be understood and heard by people.” Many young people, he added, “go in today and find a church that is for the like-minded,” as opposed to being inclusive.

同性婚姻公投中贊成與反對的比例接近2：1，對此馬丁總主教在週日表示，教會需要“一種能夠被人們理解和聽到的新語言”。他說很多年輕人“走進來，卻發現這個教會只接納志同道合者”，不具備包容性。

But he did not offer a solution for attracting young people back to the church, and reiterated his opposition to same-sex marriage.

但是他並沒有給出如何吸引年輕人重返教會的方法，只是重申了自己對同性婚姻的反對。

“For many, and I’ve said this before, inside the church becomes almost alien territory to them in today’s society,” he said. “If the leadership of the Irish Catholic church don’t recognize that, then they’re in severe denial. Have I got a magic formula? Certainly not.”

“我之前也說過，在很多人看來，教堂成了一個與當下社會隔絕的地帶，”他說道。“如果愛爾蘭天主教會的領導人無法意識到這一點，那麼他們會被大衆背棄。我有什麼妙方麼？當然沒有。”