Pubs in Ireland are to be allowed serve alcohol on Good Friday for the first time in 90 years after a ban on alcohol sales on the religious holiday was lifted.



In a further loosening of the grip of the Catholic church in the country, the intoxicating liquor bill 2017 was passed in the Dáil with all-party support and will now be enacted in time for Good Friday 2018, which falls on 30 March.

“It is a very significant change,” said Gillian Daly, of the Licensed Vintners Association in Dublin. “Easter is a big weekend with tourists flocking to Ireland, and a lot of them show up for the world-famous Irish pubs and are shocked to find they are not open. It has been a long wait for this.”

Easter weekend is arguably the biggest religious feast in the Catholic calendar. Drinkers regularly ignored the booze ban and stocked up at off-licences on Holy Thursday.

Introducing the bill in the Dáil, the minister David Stanton said overturning the ban on selling alcohol was a sign of “changing demographics and increasing diversity in our population”, which he said had “led to a reduction in traditional religious practice” in the country.

The church and state were once so intertwined in Ireland that there were also bans on divorce and contraception, both now long gone. A ban on abortion has been more divisive, with a referendum on the issue expected before the summer.

The Northern Ireland hospitality sector made an immediate call for full alignment in the region. Pubs in the north are open on Good Friday but permitted to serve alcohol only between 5pm and 11pm.