Irish Stand Up to Trump
BY ANDY HUMM | While America was reeling from the election results, Aodhán Ó Ríordáin took the floor of the Irish Senate on November 11 and said with passion, “America has just elected a fascist, and the best thing that the good people in Ireland can do is to ring him up and ask him, […]
Reconciliation the New Spirit of St. Pat’s Parade
BY KATHLEEN WARNOCK | The group of about 100 who marched with the Lavender and Green Alliance in the New York City St. Patrick’s Day Parade on March 17 – the second year in which an openly LGBTQ Irish group was allowed to participate – were all about the business of turning an inaugural […]
St. Pat’s For All Bigger, Stronger than Ever
BY KATHLEEN WARNOCK | Some asked Brendan Fay and Kathleen Walsh D’Arcy, the co-chairs of the inclusive St. Pat’s for All Parade in Queens whether they’d stop marching in Sunnyside after last year’s decision to let an openly LGBT Irish group march in the Fifth Avenue St. Patrick’s Day Parade. Their answer was a resounding […]
Irish Heritage Celebrated in Music and Words
BY KATHLEEN WARNOCK | While the St. Pat’s for All Parade is held on the first Sunday in March every year, the celebration begins the Friday evening before, with the Concert for St. Pat’s for All, which serves as a fundraiser as well as a chance for supporters to get a taste of what’s coming […]
Irish President to Honor Brendan Fay, Kathleen Walsh D’Arcy
BY KATHLEEN WARNOCK | An Irishman who came to America and an Irish-American woman whose family has been here for nearly a century are going back to the old country to be honored by its president for “sustained and distinguished service to Ireland and Irish communities abroad.” Brendan Fay and Kathleen Walsh D’Arcy are two of the […]
St. Pat’s For All Parade Steps Off Into a New Era
BY KATHLEEN WARNOCK | Each year, the festivities surrounding the annual St. Pat’s For All parade in Queens seem to expand a bit more. The parade steps off the first Sunday in March, and after wending its way from Sunnyside to Woodside and Jackson Heights its participants fan out to Irish music festival events spread around […]
Snowy Streets, Silent Trains Don’t Dampen St. Pat’s For All
BY KATHLEEN WARNOCK | With both the MTA and the weather working against the 16th annual St. Pat’s for All Parade in Sunnyside, a stalwart contingent still made its way to Queens on Sunday to march through a snowstorm in an inclusive celebration of Ireland’s national saint. The first flakes of snow fell hours earlier than […]
Kerry Kennedy Lauds “Celebration” Over “Tolerance”
BY PAUL SCHINDLER | Kerry Kennedy minced no words in characterizing the longstanding policy of Manhattan’s St. Patrick’s Day Parade in excluding openly LGBT participants. The president of the Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice & Human Rights, named for her slain father, Kennedy recalled a meeting a year or so ago with LGBT leaders in […]
When a Straight Irishman Stumbles into a Gay Parade
BY KATHLEEN WARNOCK | It all started with the big drum. “I had built the biggest drum in the world, 15 feet in diameter,” Brian Fleming said. “The drum they called the biggest drum in the world, it looked like a little bongo compared to mine!” Fleming, who lives in County Clare, Ireland, decided that the […]
Looking Back, Looking Forward
BY KATHLEEN WARNOCK | As the US Supreme Court prepares to take on the question of marriage equality for the final — perhaps — time, the worldwide push for LGBT rights continues on many other fronts. Marriage equality is also the topic this spring in Ireland, where it will be the subject of a national referendum. […]
