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Amid crimson theater drapes at a leading Oslo LGBTQ+ venue, the Norwegian Lutheran Church issued a formal apology for hurtful actions and exclusion perpetrated over the years.

“Norway's church has inflicted LGBTQ+ people shame, great harm and pain,” the presiding bishop, Bishop Tveit, stated on Thursday. “This ought not to have occurred and this is why today I say sorry.”

“Harassment, discrimination and unfair treatment” led to some to lose their faith, Tveit acknowledged. A religious service at Oslo Cathedral was planned to come after the apology.

The apology occurred at a venue called London Pub, a bar that was one of two targeted in the 2022 attack that resulted in two deaths and left nine seriously injured at Oslo's Pride event. An individual of Iranian descent living in Norway, who swore loyalty to Islamic State, was sentenced to no less than 30 years behind bars for carrying out the attacks.

Similar to numerous global faiths, Norway's church – a Lutheran evangelical community that is the most extensive faith community in the country – for years sidelined LGBTQ+ people, denying them the opportunity to become pastors or from marrying in religious ceremonies. In the 1950s, bishops of the church characterized LGBTQ+ persons as “a global-scale societal hazard”.

However, as Norway's society grew more liberal, becoming the second in the world to allow same-sex registered partnerships back in 1993 and during 2009 the initial Nordic nation to approve gay marriage, the church gradually changed.

In 2007, the Church of Norway began ordaining LGBTQ+ clergy, and same-sex couples could have church weddings from 2017 onward. In 2023, Tveit participated in the Oslo Pride event in what was noted as a first for the church.

Thursday’s apology received a mixed reaction. The leader of an organization for Christian lesbians in Norway, Hanne Marie Pedersen-Eriksen, herself a gay pastor, called it “an important reparation” and a point in time that “signaled the conclusion of a dark chapter in the history of the church”.

As stated by Stephen Adom, the leader of Norway’s Association for Gender and Sexual Diversity, the statement was “strong and important” but arrived “not in time for those who lost their lives to AIDS … carrying heavy hearts since the church viewed the epidemic to be God’s punishment”.

Globally, several faith-based organizations have attempted to reconcile for historical treatment towards LGBTQ+ people. Last year, England's church expressed regret for what it referred to as its “shameful” treatment, although it persists in refusing to permit gay marriages in church.

In a similar vein, Ireland's Methodist Church the previous year expressed regret for its “failures in pastoral support and care” toward LGBTQ+ individuals and family members, but remained staunch in its conviction that marriage could only be a union between a man and a woman.

Several months ago, the United Church based in Canada offered an apology to two spirit and LGBTQIA+ communities, describing it as a renewed commitment of its “pledge to complete acceptance and open hospitality” throughout every area of church life.

“We did not manage to rejoice and take pleasure in the beauty of all creation,” Reverend Blair, the general secretary of the church, remarked. “We caused pain to people rather than pursuing healing. We express our regret.”