Friday's historic referendum will be followed in eight days by the related matter of the GAA's special congress on Rule 21. That they became related is largely a function of the Belfast Agreement presenting the Association's president Joe McDonagh with an opening which he wisely - and bravely - exploited.

Given the importance of the referendum, the debate on Rule 21, which prohibits members of the northern security forces from GAA membership, has been predictably muted but enough noise has broken through to give a picture of how the issue is progressing.

McDonagh's original plan to suspend standing orders and push for abolition on the Saturday of Annual Congress was shelved because of hostile responses from northern Central Council delegates who were granted the extra few weeks to come to terms with the president's determination to rid the GAA of unwelcome historical baggage.

Consequently, it's hardly surprising that the most agitated contributions to the debate have come from Ulster. Living with the conflict in Northern Ireland and drawing its membership exclusively from one side, the GAA and its members in those counties have had a difficult relationship with the northern security forces.

Those difficulties have in the past been used as a basis for Ulster being the effective arbiter of whether Rule 21 is abolished or not.

Emotionally, the argument has been unstoppable. The persecution of Crossmaglen Rangers and the annexing of their pitch by the British Army has been an annual item on the Congress clar and it would be hard for anyone from the south Armagh club to be very enthusiastic about deleting Rule 21.

If the provision is regarded as some sort of quid pro quo - a calculated slight to be weighed in the balance against the calculated slights suffered by nationalists - this is a logical stance.

If, however, it is actually an anachronistic measure which the GAA forgot to scrub before the northern conflict ignited 30 years ago and which in the meantime has mutated into little more than sectarian fist-shaking, then the argument is on less sure ground.

According to a report - subsequently confirmed - in the Sunday Independent, chairmen of the nine Ulster counties met in Monaghan nine days ago. It was decided that whereas the "GAA would be the loser" if the ban did not eventually go, that the time - with the northern marching season imminent - was not yet right.

Furthermore, it was felt that the debate should be postponed and staged in Wexford along with a special congress on hurling due in the autumn.

The venue was believed to be particularly appropriate in the light of the 1798 bicentenary and the commemoration of the ideals of the United Irishmen - although the vision of uniting Protestant, Catholic and Dissenter was presumably an unconditional one rather than something that required a few months to see if it was a good idea.

Generous gestures are only generous if they are difficult to make. No one is arguing that the choice facing northern counties is an easy one, but circumstances make it quite inappropriate that the highly-charged atmosphere north of the border should be allowed generate a decisive opinion on Rule 21.

ONE OF the straws to which the GAA has in the past clung when wishing to palliate moves to sideline debate on the issue has been the Association's role in healing previous conflicts. This principally refers to the way in which the cause of Kerry football unity helped heal divisions caused by the Civil War and subsequent political rifts.

This process has been thoroughly and painstakingly detailed in JJ Barrett's fine book on the subject In the Name of the Game. The parties who reconciled had been culpable of terrible actions against each other but set aside their differences.

At one point, Barrett quotes Johnny Walsh, a noted anti-republican and winner of five All-Ireland medals, as remembering an incident when he blurted out a political opinion in front of Con Brosnan, a team-mate, Free State army officer and central figure in the reconciliation process whom the young Walsh much admired.

"Con shut me up by saying don't ever speak politics on a football train."

Unfortunately the difference between then and now is that the parties in need of reconciliation have no community of interest to assist the process. But the central lesson is there: forgiveness and release of the past are necessary first steps.

Sinn Fein youth protested outside Omagh's Healy Park on Sunday before the Tyrone-Down championship match. The protest was aimed at moves to delete Rule 21.

There were a couple of ironies in this. The most obvious is that the party has accepted the Belfast Agreement and signed up to, inter alia the Commission on policing for Northern Ireland in Annex A. The fact that this commission won't publish a report for another year (summer 1999) hasn't blocked acceptance of the principle.

Yet, having invested in good faith in the reform of the police, Sinn Fein youth expect the GAA to remain intransigent until the reforms are complete.

Eamonn Rafferty's book Talking Gaelic, a penetrative account of what the GAA means to a whole variety of Irish and Northern Irish public figures, contains one indisputable finding. Protestants who were intrigued by the phenomena of football and hurling - among them Robert McCartney and Gary McMichael - cited Rule 21 as evidence of what they perceive as an institutional hostility towards their community.

Protestants obviously aren't going to tumble onto the playing fields as soon as Rule 21 goes. But there'll be no start made on perceptions of the GAA amongst that community until it does.

The second irony in Sinn Fein youth's attitude is that whereas forgiveness and release of the past is in clearly short supply when it comes to the security forces, the same qualities are expected on tap when it comes to prisoners, from either side, guilty of appalling atrocities.

The irony for Protestants will be that while many republican terrorists can pass through the GAA, a blameless policeman cannot. There's nothing strange about the former situation: any large-scale, voluntary organisation will reflect its community without standing over all the activities within, but the latter is harder to explain.

Rule 21 is a log on the bonfire of sectarianism in Northern Ireland. Regardless of what happens in the weeks ahead, the rule should go.

If the GAA is not part of the solution to simmering inter-community tensions, it will remain part of the problem and at a time when the island has the chance to vote as a whole on its future, that is something that all delegates - north and south - in the Burlington on Saturday week should remember.