Thinking back to this time last year, I certainly didn’t expect to be looking at an equality map showing that 17 states and the District of Columbia have extended the freedom to marry to same-sex couples. But in nearly every region of this country, we’ve seen monumental progress that has dramatically changed the map.

A little less than one year ago, the final state in the northeast passed marriage -- a major victory after years of hard work in Rhode Island. A few months later, we added two states in the midwest -- Minnesota and Illinois -- huge steps forward in America’s heartland. Litigation brought marriage equality to California (joining Washington on the west coast) and to New Mexico (the first state in the southwest).

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Map Credit: Freedom to Marry

And yet, it’s clear we still have a long way to go. Large swaths of the country still deny loving, committed couples the freedom to marry -- and a host of other critical protections under the law. Progress is happening -- even in the reddest states in the country -- through legislatures, upcoming ballot initiatives and in the courts where dozens of legal cases have been filed across the country.

In the last days of 2013, hundreds of committed couples wed in Utah when a federal court struck down the state’s ban on marriage for same-sex couples. Although the Supreme Court stayed the decision, halting marriages as the case continues through the appeals process, the ruling was historic. Utah is often considered one of the most (if not the most) conservative states in the country, and for a few short weeks, LGBT families, which are all too often made invisible in red states, took center stage to share their love with their neighbors in the Beehive State.

Only a few weeks later, another federal district court judge ruled that Oklahoma’s marriage ban was unconstitutional. The decision was again stayed, but the stories of the plaintiff couples have resonated throughout the Sooner State, changing hearts and minds. Mary Bishop and Sharon Baldwin are a Tulsa couple who have been together for 17 years; Gay Phillips and Susan Barton were legally married in Canada and later joined together in civil union in Vermont. These two couples have become the courageous faces of the still-evolving fight for marriage in Oklahoma.

The red state momentum for marriage picked up even more steam when Virginia Attorney General Mark Herring announced that he would not defend a state statute and constitutional amendment that denies the freedom to marry to same-sex couples. Two cases are currently making their way through federal court in Virginia, and both enjoy the Attorney General’s support -- Harris v. McDonnell, filed by the ACLU, Lambda Legal, and the ACLU of Virginia, and Bostic v. Rainey, filed by private lawyers and supported by the American Foundation for Equal Rights.

From the great plains to the southeast, we’re seeing historic movement for marriage in red states. These efforts are the result of strategic, high-impact litigation by our legal partners at the ACLU, Lambda, GLAD, NCLR, AFER and others; by robust on-the-ground organizing from Federation members including Equality Utah, The Equality Network and Equality Virginia; and of nationwide public education and advocacy by our friends at Freedom to Marry, Human Rights Campaign, and The Task Force.

I don’t know what our marriage equality map will look like in another year. But if last year was any indication, we’ll continue to see unprecedented momentum in every part of the country -- from the most conservative states to some of the most progressive.