Thirty-fourth Amendment of the Constitution of Ireland this referendum is equality under the Constitution and anything else is extraneous." However, some religious-affiliated groups were in favour of the referendum. In January 2015, the Church of Ireland LGBT group "Changing Attitude Ireland" welcomed the publication of the wording of the Marriage Equality Referendum. Dr Richard O’Leary, the organisation's chair, said that marriage should be "available to couples without distinction as to their sex", just as civil marriage "may be contracted by two persons without distinction as to their race or religion". On 7 May, at a "Changing Attitude Ireland" event, former Archdeacon of Dublin, Gordon Linney said "We
United Ireland support for a referendum stands at 53% of Catholics, while 72% of Protestant respondents were opposed to the idea. A poll in May 2017 found that 51% were in favour of holding a referendum on a united Ireland within the next five years. In October 2017 a poll found that 61.94 percent were in favour of having a referendum on a united Ireland within the next ten years. The same poll found that 55 percent of those asked would vote to remain within the United Kingdom if a referendum was held tomorrow while 33.7 percent said they would vote yes