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Against crimson theater drapes at one of Oslo’s most prominent LGBTQ+ spaces, the Norwegian Lutheran Church issued a formal apology for harm and unequal treatment it had inflicted.

“The church in Norway has caused LGBTQ+ individuals shame, great harm and pain,” the presiding bishop, the church leader, declared during a Thursday event. “It was wrong for this to take place and that is why I apologise today.”

The “discrimination, unequal treatment and harassment” had caused some to lose their faith, Tveit recognized. A church service at the cathedral in Oslo was arranged to follow his apology.

This formal apology took place at a venue called London Pub, a bar that was one of two attacked during the 2022 attack that killed two people and injured nine people severely throughout the Oslo Pride festivities. An individual of Iranian descent living in Norway, who swore loyalty to Islamic State, was sentenced to a minimum of three decades in prison for carrying out the attacks.

In common with various worldwide religions, Norway's church – a Lutheran evangelical community that is the most extensive faith community in the country – had long marginalised LGBTQ+ people, preventing them from serving as pastors or to marry in church. Back in the 1950s, church leaders characterized LGBTQ+ persons as a “social danger of global proportions”.

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

In 2007, the Norwegian Lutheran Church started appointing gay pastors, and gay and lesbian couples have been able to get married in religious ceremonies starting in 2017. Last year, the bishop took part in Oslo’s Pride parade in what was noted as a historic moment for the religious institution.

The Thursday statement of regret received varied responses. The head of a network for Christian lesbians in Norway, Hanne Marie Pedersen-Eriksen, a lesbian minister herself, called it “a significant step toward healing” and a moment that “represented the closure of a painful era within the church's past”.

According to Stephen Adom, the director of the Association for Gender and Sexual Diversity in Norway, the apology represented “powerful and significant” but was delivered “overdue for individuals who passed away from AIDS … with hearts filled with anguish because the church considered the crisis as divine punishment”.

Worldwide, a handful of religious institutions have sought to make amends for historical treatment towards LGBTQ+ people. During 2023, England's church expressed regret for what it referred to as its “shameful” treatment, although it still declines to allow same-sex marriages in church.

Similarly, Ireland's Methodist Church the previous year issued an apology for “inadequate pastoral assistance and care” to LGBTQ+ people and their families, but held fast in the view that marriage should only represent a partnership of one man and one woman.

Earlier this year, the United Church of Canada offered an apology toward Two-Spirit and LGBTQIA+ individuals, labeling it a reaffirmation of the church’s “commitment to radical hospitality and full inclusion” in all aspects of church life.

“We have failed to rejoice and take pleasure in the wonderful diversity of creation,” Reverend Blair, the top administrative leader of the church, remarked. “We caused pain to people rather than pursuing healing. We apologize.”