It was 4 in the morning when a full day of heated debates in a country heavily influenced by the Catholic Church came to an end and the Argentinian Senate passed a divisive law that will allow homosexuals to feel free to experience full marriage rights. Over 100 thousand Christian protesters made as much noise as they could for long cold hours (temperatures right now in the Southern parts of South America are reaching lows of minus 5 degrees Celsius), but to no avail. A political decision was made by president Cristina Kirchner, who insisted that some laws have to come before the population is ready for it, to help society accept it, even mentioning the example of civil rights in the United States, reminding that when president Lyndon Johnson pushed for the encoding of the prohibition of racial discrimination, if a popular vote was called, the result would certainly keep the then apartheid. So, with merely 33 votes out of 72 (27 votes against and 3 were abstinent) Senators, Argentina broke a taboo that promises to spread all over the Continent.

Hugo Chavez is known for his support of gay issues and is rumoured to follow on the steps of his ally, Kirchner, and propose a similar law just after this year's elections, so as to not lose more conservative votes. Uruguay is already scheduling a date to vote on the same subject and in one federate state of Brazil (Rio Grande do Sul), the local highest court has decided, and the regional parliament has approved, that homosexuals have full marriage rights after living together for more than 5 years.

The Catholic Church has been seriously wounded with the sexual abuse scandals that popped up all over the world, but these past few months Brazil, Bolivia, Ecuador, Argentina and Colombia saw similar local affairs, one even with a series of videos showing local priests and even bishops practicing sex with young males, all of which weakened considerably what was once a respected institution. The emergence of more fun evangelical churches, where believers dance, sing and hear a pastor that speaks a similar everyday language have already co-opted 30 percent of Catholics in the past 20 years. The military regimes that took over the Continent throughout the 1970s and 1980s were all supported by the Catholic elite, so after the fall of those regimes the lower classes started migrating to pentecostal faiths.

How much longer will it take for the Czech society, which is much more liberal and almost untouched by Christian moralisms, to let homosexuals adopt, for example? How equal can I feel if I am told that it is ok for me to live and pay taxes in the Czech Republic, but (for the sake of understanding the absurd of the situation) I am told that, as a Brazilian, I cannot adopt a kid.