Normally, glaciers move at the speed of, well, glaciers. But sometimes, when conditions are right, a glacier’s seaward face suddenly plummets into the sea.

Something similar is happening with marriage equality. Perhaps the first sign came in New Hampshire, where the Legislature’s newly overwhelming majority of Republicans pledged to repeal a same-sex marriage law passed by Democrats two years earlier. The effort fizzled, with nearly half the Republicans voting instead to uphold the law.

Now, it’s Maine’s turn.

We know that social and political change happens slowly, is often resisted, but when it occurs, it alters something fundamental about ourselves. It has begun to dawn on people that denying gays and lesbians the right to marry makes no more sense than denying blacks the right to vote, or the right of interracial couples to marry. As a civil rights issue, it’s crystal clear: Existing law is unjust.

That does not mean change will be easy. A key event, though, was the gathering of a group of 20 prominent Republicans who support the Nov. 6 marriage equality referendum.

It’s a mark of the oddness of this political moment that the event should be notable. When civil rights for gays and lesbians first became an issue in the 1970s, the divisions were not partisan. Republicans, who then emphasized fiscal responsibility and individual freedoms, were almost as likely to favor “gay rights” as Democrats.

But the drift of both parties toward deadlock, and the continued rightward Republican march, means that it was indeed news that three current GOP House members, joined by business leaders and a former congressional nominee, pledged support.

This did not please Rev. Bob Emrich, pastor of the Emmanuel Baptist Church, and de facto opposition leader. Emrich played the role of spokesman during the people’s veto campaign of 2009 which did, indeed, overturn the marriage equality law passed by a Democratic Legislature that year.

Emrich was politically safer than the notorious Michael Heath, then director of the Christian Civic League, whose creepy bloggings about “outing” state officials put him beyond the pale.

Since then, the anti-marriage equality forces have lost their other spokesman, Mark Mutty, a respected Catholic who later regretted the tactics used in 2009 – which focused heavily on the non-existent possibility that first-graders would be indoctrinated about homosexuality. This time, the Catholic Church is speaking to its parishioners, but not in public.

Emrich is in a tough position. You’d have to be numb not to have noticed that attitudes toward marriage have shifted.

Opposition in southern states has traded heavily on the reluctance of blacks to even discuss the subject, but now that President Obama has announced support, rethinking is taking place.

So Emrich, having nothing of substance, resorted to derision. His sound bite quote: “The Republican Party has recognized that marriage is between a man and a woman since 1856.” True, but until eight years ago this wasn’t even a possibility. A 2004 Iowa court decision mandating equality is what started it all.

He next tried to belittle the Republicans individually, calling them “insignificant” and saying, “There are no leaders in that group.”

They sound like leaders. Rep. Stacey Fitts (R-Pittsfield) who had the unenviable job of standing up, successfully, to Gov. Paul LePage on energy policy, said he regretted his vote against the 2009 bill. “I’ve thought about it a lot,” he said. “It’s OK to change your mind.”

“I don’t know why these people even call themselves Republicans,” Emrich fumed.

The traditional understanding of Republicanism was aptly expressed by Rep. Meredith Strang Burgess (R-Cumberland) who did support the 2009 bill. “This is about the fundamental right to marry the person you love without the government getting in the way,” she said.

There will be a lot more words between now and November, but it’s doubtful voters need much more persuasion.

Mainers United for Marriage, the group that put the question on the ballot, has pursued the correct strategy in emphasizing conversations with voters in places that registered the greatest opposition in 2009, such as Aroostook County, where 73 percent said “no.”

Many young people are getting their first taste of political organizing in this campaign, traveling to places most would never see otherwise. If they win – as seems likely – they could be part of a new generation of leaders who are more positive, and less fearful, than those they succeed.

The opposition was still muttering. “I’m sure we could find an equal number of Democrats who support real marriage,” Emrich said, though he isn’t making much effort.

Things never change, according to Bob Emrich. Until, of course, they do.