Updated at 9:10 a.m. ET
Both sides in Ireland’s same-sex marriage debate have acknowledged that the “yes” vote has succeeded. Once official, Ireland will become the first country in the world to approve such a measure in a national referendum.
Leo Varadkar, Ireland’s health minister who came out as gay in January just as the campaign was getting underway, says Dublin appears to have voted 70 percent yes.
“We’re the first country in the world to enshrine marriage equality in our constitution and do so by popular mandate,” Varadkar said. “That makes us a beacon, a light to the rest of the world of liberty and equality. It’s a very proud day to be Irish.”
NPR’s Ari Shapiro, speaking with Weekend Edition Saturday host Scott Simon, says that although Ireland is a predominately Catholic country and many clergy urged a no vote, “the Church has had a lot of scandals” in recent years. Without a doubt, he says, the Church is “one of the losers in this vote.”
The head of the Iona Institute, which ran the No campaign in Ireland’s vote to legalize same-sex marriage, has tweeted his congratulations to the yes campaign.