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Against crimson theater drapes at one of Oslo’s most prominent LGBTQ+ spaces, Norway's national church issued a formal apology for discrimination and harm it had inflicted.

“The national church has inflicted the LGBTQ+ community shame, great harm and pain,” the lead bishop, Bishop Tveit, declared this Thursday. “This ought not to have occurred and which is the reason today I say sorry.”

“Unequal treatment, harassment and discrimination” led to some to lose their faith, Tveit acknowledged. A religious service at Oslo Cathedral was scheduled to take place after his statement.

This formal apology occurred at the London Pub, one among two bars targeted in the 2022 violent incident that resulted in two deaths and injured nine people severely throughout the Oslo Pride festivities. A Norwegian of Iranian origin, who had pledged allegiance to Islamic State, was given a prison term to no less than 30 years behind bars for the murders.

In common with various worldwide religions, the Church of Norway – an evangelical Lutheran church that is the most extensive faith community in the country – had long marginalised LGBTQ+ people, denying them the opportunity from serving as pastors or to marry in church. Back in the 1950s, the church’s bishops referred to homosexual individuals as “a global-scale societal hazard”.

Yet, with Norwegian society turning more progressive, emerging as the world's second to allow same-sex registered partnerships back in 1993 and by 2009 the first Scandinavian country to approve gay marriage, the church slowly followed.

Back in 2007, the Norwegian Lutheran Church commenced the ordination of gay pastors, and same-sex couples have been able to have church weddings starting in 2017. Last year, Tveit participated in the Oslo Pride event in what was described as an unprecedented step for the church.

The Thursday statement of regret was met with differing opinions. The head of a network for Christian lesbians in Norway, Hanne Marie Pedersen-Eriksen, a lesbian minister herself, referred to it as “a significant step toward healing” and an occasion that “finally marked the end of a painful era in the church’s history”.

As stated by Stephen Adom, the director of the Norwegian Association for Gender and Sexual Diversity, the apology represented “meaningful and vital” but was delivered “overdue for individuals among us who died of Aids … with hearts filled with anguish because the church considered the crisis as punishment from God”.

Worldwide, a few churches have tried to offer apologies for historical treatment regarding LGBTQ+ individuals. During 2023, England's church expressed regret for what it characterized as “disgraceful” conduct, even as it continues to refuse to permit gay marriages in church.

Likewise, the Methodist Church located in Ireland in the past year expressed regret for its “failures in pastoral support and care” to LGBTQ+ people and their families, but remained staunch in its conviction that marriage should only represent a partnership of one man and one woman.

Earlier this year, the United Church based in Canada issued an apology to Two-Spirit and LGBTQIA+ groups, characterizing it as a renewed commitment of the church’s “commitment to radical hospitality and full inclusion” throughout every area of church life.

“We have not succeeded to honor and appreciate the beauty of all creation,” Reverend Blair, the general secretary of the church, remarked. “We have wounded people in place of fostering completeness. We express our regret.”