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Against deep red curtains at a well-known Oslo location for LGBTQ+ gatherings, the Church of Norway issued a formal apology for harm and unequal treatment perpetrated over the years.

“Norway's church has inflicted LGBTQ+ people shame, great harm and pain,” bishop Olav Fykse Tveit, Olav Fykse Tveit, declared during a Thursday event. “This should never have happened and that is why today I say sorry.”

“Harassment, discrimination and unfair treatment” resulted in a loss of faith for some, Tveit recognized. A religious service at Oslo Cathedral was planned to follow his apology.

The statement of regret was delivered at the London Pub, one among two bars involved in the 2022 attack 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 a minimum of three decades behind bars for carrying out the attacks.

Like many religions around the world, the Norwegian Lutheran Church – an evangelical Lutheran church that is the biggest religious group in Norway – had long marginalised LGBTQ+ individuals, denying them the opportunity to become pastors or to have church weddings. Back in the 1950s, the church’s bishops referred to homosexual individuals as a “social danger of global proportions”.

But as Norwegian society became increasingly liberal, becoming the second in the world to permit registered partnerships for same-sex couples during 1993 and by 2009 the first Scandinavian country to legalize same-sex marriage, the church slowly followed.

In 2007, the Norwegian Lutheran Church began ordaining LGBTQ+ clergy, and same-sex couples could get married in religious ceremonies since 2017. In 2023, the bishop took part in the Pride march in Oslo in what was described as an unprecedented step for the church.

The Thursday statement of regret elicited a mixed reaction. The head of a network representing Norwegian Christian lesbians, Hanne Marie, a lesbian minister herself, referred to it as “a crucial act of amends” and a point in time that “signaled the conclusion of a painful era in the church’s history”.

As stated by Stephen Adom, the head of Norway’s Association for Gender and Sexual Diversity, the statement was “meaningful and vital” but arrived “overdue for individuals who lost their lives to AIDS … with deep sorrow in their hearts since the church viewed the crisis to be God’s punishment”.

Internationally, a handful of religious institutions have attempted to offer apologies for historical treatment concerning the LGBTQ+ community. Last year, the Church of England expressed regret for what it referred to as “disgraceful” conduct, although it still declines to permit gay marriages in church.

In a similar vein, the Methodist Church located in Ireland in the past year apologised for “shortcomings in pastoral care and support” toward LGBTQ+ individuals and their relatives, but stayed firm in its belief that marriage should only represent a bond between male and female.

Earlier this year, Canada's United Church delivered a statement of regret to Two-Spirit and LGBTQIA+ groups, labeling it a reaffirmation of its “pledge to complete acceptance and open hospitality” in every part of the church's activities.

“We have not succeeded to honor and appreciate the beauty of all creation,” Reverend Blair, the general secretary of the church, said. “We have hurt individuals instead of seeking wholeness. We are sorry.”