In his blog post announcing his change of heart, Marinelli talks about what caused him to reconsider his decision.

Even though I had been confronted by the counter-protesters throughout the marriage tour, the lesbian and gay people whom I made a profession out of opposing became real people for me almost instantly. For the first time I had empathy for them and remember asking myself what I was doing. SNIP One article I wrote, towards the end of October, 2010 caught the attention of a blogger by the name of RJ, who writes on the blog AmIWorking. He responded to my article about the homosexual agenda with an article addressed personally to me regarding marriage equality. In short, his article had the miraculous effect of instantly putting things into prospective for me. At that point, between what I had witnessed on the marriage tour and RJ’s post about marriage equality, I really came to understand that gays and lesbians were just real people who wanted to live real lives and be treated equally as opposed to, for example, wanting to destroy American culture. No, they didn’t want to destroy American culture, they wanted to openly particulate in it. I was well on my way to becoming a supporter of civil marriage equality. You can read my statement retracting the statements I made about gays and lesbians here.

Seeing sexual minorities as human beings who want to live normal lives is what moved him. Perhaps this points to a strategy for advocates of legal reforms for sexual minorities. Our own stories, our own lives could be the most effective weapon in our arsenal.

As Marinelli noted above, he has also retracted his hateful statements about sexual minorities. He did this in an email interview with Good As You.

As a supporter of civil marriage equality, any statements I’ve made in the past about not recognizing homosexual relationships for one reason or another, of course it goes without saying that I no longer stand by these comments and I apologize for the insensitivity. Same-sex couples, whether they are married, in civil unions or domestic partnerships, ought to be recognized for what they are. SNIP I consider myself agnostic and while homosexual acts may very well be “immoral” in the eyes of Christian morality, I can no longer stand by any comments I’ve made in the past about the immorality of homosexuality. There are a variety of different sets and sources of morals and no one has the right to impose their set on the rest of society.

Good As You broke this story and has a lot of information about Marinelli's past work with NOM and more of the interview I quoted above. He calls Peter LaBarbera a "hateful man" and expresses regret for spreading Paul Cameron's anti-gay propaganda masquerading as research.

As a homophobia researcher, this news really has my head spinning. That such a prominent, die-hard opponent of marriage equality would so publicly come out and repudiate his past statements is a big step forward for marriage equality movement. If such a hateful bigot who profited from hurting sexual minorities can change his mind, there are millions of others out there who can be reached as well.

We. Are. Winning.

Update

Is merely being celebrating Marinelli's change of heart not enough for you? GetEQUAL has a nifty tool so you can gloat, as well:

Sorry For Your Loss, NOM During the summer of 2010, the National Organization for Marriage assembled a bus tour across the country, holding events intended to rally folks behind the "one man, one woman" meme. Unfortunately, very few people showed up to support NOM -- but thousands of people showed up to protest the tour de hate. And, now, the very guy who originally conceived of the bus tour -- Louis Marinelli -- has publicly endorsed civil marriage for LGBT Americans! Send a note of condolences to NOM's two remaining bigots, Maggie Gallagher and Brian Brown, to let them know that their movement of hatred is dying!!

Click here to send your condolences to Maggie and Brian.

(h/t indiemcemopants)

Update 2

Louis Marinelli mentioned a blog post that influenced his thinking. The blogger republished the post today. Here is the link.

(h/t Keith Pickering)

Update 3

(h/t Clarknt67)