ITALY: While a party mood prevails at the Rome Gay Pride parade, participants criticise the Vatican's power over gay rights issues in Italy

Record ID: 277885

  • Title: ITALY: While a party mood prevails at the Rome Gay Pride parade, participants criticise the Vatican's power over gay rights issues in Italy
  • Date: 15th June 2013
  • Summary: ROME, ITALY (JUNE 15, 2013) (REUTERS) GAY PRIDE PARADE MOVING PAST THE COLOSSEUM PEOPLE DANCING AND WALKING PARTICIPANTS WITH TOILET PAPER ROLLS ON THEIR HEADS DRESSED IN MAID OUTFITS HOLDING BANNERS READING (Italian): "CLEAN AWAY HOMOPHOBIA" PARADE IN PROGRESS WITH COLOSSEUM IN BACKGROUND BANNER READING (Italian): "MY FREEDOM PROTECTS YOURS" PARTICIPANTS MARCHING IN STRE
  • Embargoed: 30th June 2013 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Italy
  • Country: Italy
  • Topics: Domestic Politics,Religion
  • Reuters ID: LVA5UY41ZJ74XODFDHD7K190HGSX
  • Story Text: The grounds once trampled by gladiators were, on Saturday (June 15), overtaken by jubilant, colourful crowds at Rome's annual Gay Pride parade.
    Love was in the air as the parade snaked through the Eternal City's cobblestone streets and past the capital's most famous landmark, the Colosseum.
    Lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex individuals were dressed to impress, travelling on foot or on decorated parade floats and trucks.
    The festive parade had a more serious message beneath, expressed through banners and posters calling for equal rights and supporting same-sex marriage.
    The issue of gay rights is especially controversial in Italy, with the Vatican having criticised Gay Pride events in the past.

    "It is my right to be able to have a relationship with a man without needing to justify myself, to have the same prerogatives and the same rights as heterosexual couples," participant Massimo Marra, wearing a pink wig and heart-shaped sunglasses, said.
    Marra said he didn't expect the Catholic country to follow in the footsteps of neighbouring France in legalising same-sex marriages any time soon.

    "It is too easy a question. The power the Catholic Church has in Italy is too strong. And in my opinion we'll never get there," he added.
    Earlier in the day, during a private audience in the Vatican, Pope Francis urged a delegation of French lawmakers to avoid following only "fashions and ideas of the moment", when legislating, in an apparent reference to the country's legalisation of gay marriage last month.
    The law granting gay men and lesbians equality in marriage and adoption has been among the most divisive of French President Francois Hollande's first year in office, pitting a predominantly liberal public in mostly Roman Catholic France against traditionalists, the far-right and many churchgoers.
    Without making any specific mention of the law, Francis said the Church should have a voice in political issues even in staunchly secular France.
    Many of the parade participants voiced their opposition to the Church's power over gay rights issues in Italy.

    "I think that we're living in a town where the Vatican has too much power and I think the Vatican needs to be told to listen. I'm pro-life, I have a child," said Katy Spurrell, who has lived in Rome for over 20 years.
    Francesco Tomassini said he believed the Vatican's influence was stopping the country from moving forward.

    "In my opinion we lag behind the rest of the world because we have the Vatican. It has always been the flaw of Italy. This would be a fantastic country if there wasn't this block, this chain that keeps us linked to the past but must no longer be present," he said.
    Tomassini's friend Luca Camuffo, meanwhile, said he believed that there was hope but Italians were simply slower in adapting to change than other countries.

    "The time has already come but in Italy, as always, things take forever. If we learned from history we'd know that Italy will always take much longer," he said.
    According to organisers some 40,000 revellers took part in this year's parade.
    LGBTI
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