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Against deep red curtains at a well-known Oslo location for LGBTQ+ gatherings, Norway's national church issued a formal apology for hurtful actions and exclusion caused by the church.

“Norway's church has caused LGBTQ+ individuals pain, shame and significant harm,” the presiding bishop, the church leader, declared on Thursday. “This ought not to have occurred and which is the reason I apologise today.”

“Harassment, discrimination and unfair treatment” led to some to lose their faith, Tveit acknowledged. A worship service at Oslo's main cathedral was arranged to come after the apology.

This formal apology took place at the London Pub, one among two bars involved in the 2022 shooting that killed two people and left nine seriously injured throughout the Oslo Pride festivities. A Norwegian citizen originally from Iran, who had pledged allegiance to Islamic State, was sentenced to no less than 30 years behind bars for the killings.

Like many religions around the world, the Norwegian Lutheran Church – a Protestant Lutheran denomination that is the biggest religious group in Norway – for years sidelined the LGBTQ+ community, denying them the opportunity from serving as pastors or to have church weddings. Back in the 1950s, bishops of the church 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 legalize same-sex partnerships back in 1993 and during 2009 the initial Nordic nation to approve gay marriage, the religious institution eventually adapted.

Back in 2007, Norway's church began ordaining gay pastors, and LGBTQ+ partners have been able to have church weddings since 2017. In 2023, the bishop took part in the Oslo Pride event in what was described as a historic moment for the religious institution.

The Thursday statement of regret was met with varied responses. The leader of an organization for Christian lesbians in Norway, Hanne Marie, a lesbian minister herself, described it as “a significant step toward healing” and a moment that “represented the closure of a difficult period in the history of the church”.

For Stephen Adom, the head of the Norwegian Association for Gender and Sexual Diversity, the apology was “meaningful and vital” but arrived “not in time for those among us who died of Aids … with deep sorrow in their hearts since the church viewed the epidemic as divine punishment”.

Worldwide, several faith-based organizations have tried to reconcile for their actions regarding LGBTQ+ individuals. During 2023, the Church of England apologised for what it referred to as “shameful” actions, although it still declines to allow same-sex marriages in church.

Likewise, the Methodist Church located in Ireland last year issued an apology for its “failures in pastoral support and care” toward LGBTQ+ individuals and family members, but stayed firm in the view that marriage should only represent a union between a man and a woman.

Several months ago, Canada's United Church delivered a statement of regret to Two-Spirit and LGBTQIA+ groups, describing it as a renewed commitment of the church’s “commitment to radical hospitality and full inclusion” in all aspects of church life.

“We did not manage to celebrate and delight in the wonderful diversity of creation,” Reverend Blair, the general secretary of the church, stated. “We have hurt individuals in place of fostering completeness. We apologize.”