[12] He was a member of the O'Toole family which launched Gaelic raids on the Anglo-Norman Pale, and modern historians regard the charges as politically motivated.
[22] An act of 1695 abolished the writ de heretico comburendo under which heretics were burned at the stake; Church of Ireland courts retained the power to punish "atheism, blasphemy, heresy, or schism, or other damnable doctrines and opinions ... by excommunication, deprivation, degradation, and other ecclesiastical censures, not extending to death".
In 1713, Peter Browne, bishop of Cork and Ross preached that loyal toasts to "the glorious, pious, and immortal memory" of King William were blasphemous.
[35] In 1852, John Syngean Bridgman, a Franciscan friar, was convicted at the assizes for County Mayo after burning an Authorized (King James) version of the New Testament.
[37][36][38] In 1855 at Kingstown, a King James Bible and New Testament were burned on a bonfire of "irreligious" books organised by Vladimir Petcherine, a Redemptorist Catholic priest.
[43] The last British prosecution until 1977 was Bowman v Secular Society Limited in 1917,[44] in which the Law Lords ruled that the crime of blasphemy implied not just the substance ("denial of Christian doctrine") but also the manner ("vilification, ridicule, or irreverence").
[51] In 1960, Paul O'Higgins criticised the 1937 constitution's blasphemy provision as introducing uncertainty, and possibly increased stricture, compared to the common law as developed to that date.
[54][55] In 1956, two Jehovah's Witnesses proselytising in Clonlara were accosted by a mob led by the Catholic parish priest claiming their opposition to Trinitarianism was blasphemous.
"[67] The Law Reform Commission's 1991 Report opined that "there is no place for the offence of blasphemous libel in a society which respects freedom of speech".
[69] The commission's report, therefore, outlined criteria for a statutory definition of blasphemy which could serve until such time as Article 40.6.1.i might be changed as part of a broader constitutional amendment.
In March 2008, Brian Lenihan, then Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform, said:[14] In England and Wales blasphemy traditionally only consisted in the scandalising of the established church.
[74] Neville Cox stated:[74] When the English Parliament originally enacted blasphemy laws, it was with a view to appeasing an angry God who was irritated by despicable literature and who was causing plagues and fires to occur in London.
The Law Commission in England suggested that there were two types of situation where what had previously been characterised as blasphemous material might generate a public interest in its prohibition.
It is, therefore, a misdescription of a changed law.The Oireachtas Committee's report concluded:[15] The reference itself has effectively been rendered a "dead letter" by virtue of the decision of the Supreme Court in Corway.
[76] Upon conviction under section 36, a court warrant could authorise the Garda Síochána (police) to enter premises to search for and seize any copies of the blasphemous material.
[82] On the date on which the law came into effect, it published a series of potentially blasphemous quotations on its website and vowed to challenge any resulting legal action.
[85] In 2016, Neville Cox said, "My view is the 2009 Act fulfilled a constitutional obligation on the crime of blasphemy, but skilfully rendered the law completely unenforceable.
[89] On 8 May 2017, the Garda said they would not proceed with an investigation as no injured parties had come forward and they were "unable to find a substantial number of outraged people".
[110] In October 2014, Minister of State Aodhán Ó Ríordáin gave the official government response to the convention's report on blasphemy, announcing that it had decided to hold a referendum on the issue.
[115] After the May 2017 story about Stephen Fry, a Department of Justice and Equality spokesperson said that it had undertaken "preliminary consultations and preparatory work" on the amendment, with future scheduling to be decided by the government.
[6] In September 2017, new Taoiseach Leo Varadkar gave an "indicative timeline" for planned referendums, with that on blasphemy in October 2018, simultaneous with the presidential election.
[118] The Thirty-seventh Amendment of the Constitution (Repeal of offence of publication or utterance of blasphemous matter) Bill was formally introduced to the Dáil on 13 July.
[123] When the referendum result was announced, the Minister for Justice and Equality Charles Flanagan welcomed it and then introduced legislation to repeal the relevant sections of the 2009 Act.
[125] The bill would repeal sections 36 and 37 of the 2009 Act, remove blasphemy as grounds for banning a film, and "for the avoidance of doubt" explicitly abolish the common law offence of blasphemous libel.
[139] Monty Python's Life of Brian was banned by Frank Hall in 1980 for being blasphemous;[140] when resubmitted in 1987 it was passed uncut by his successor Sheamus Smith.
[141] The Censor's bans on The Masque of the Red Death (1964, for "blasphemy and horror"[142]) and Audrey Rose (1977, for "heresy"[143]) were overturned by the Appeals Board, which includes both a Catholic and Protestant clergyman.
[86] The Censorship of Publications Acts (1929 and 1946) did not include blasphemy among possible grounds for banning, which were indecency, obscenity, promotion of "unnatural" contraception or abortion, and (in the case of periodicals) excessive focus on crime.
[150] A 2005 Paddy Power poster, parodying Leonardo da Vinci's The Last Supper with Jesus and the apostles in a casino, was withdrawn for breaching the religion guidelines as well as "taste and decency".
[151] The Broadcasting Authority of Ireland's 2015 code of programme standards requires material to "show due respect for religious views, images, practices and beliefs".
[152] In 2021 RTÉ apologised for a Waterford Whispers News satirical report, on the arrest of God for raping of Mary, which the Catholic Archbishop of Armagh called "deeply offensive and blasphemous".