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Against red stage curtains at a leading Oslo LGBTQ+ venue, Norway's national church offered an apology for hurtful actions and exclusion caused by the church.

“The church in Norway has inflicted LGBTQ+ people shame, great harm and pain,” the lead bishop, Bishop Tveit, announced this Thursday. “This should never have happened and that is why I offer my apology now.”

The “discrimination, unequal treatment and harassment” had caused certain individuals abandoning their faith, Tveit recognized. A worship service at Oslo's main cathedral was planned to come after the apology.

The apology occurred at the London Pub establishment, one of two bars attacked during the 2022 violent incident that killed two people and caused serious injuries to nine during Oslo’s Pride celebrations. A Norwegian citizen originally from Iran, who swore loyalty to Islamic State, was sentenced to at least 30 years behind bars for carrying out the attacks.

Like many religions around the world, the Church of Norway – an evangelical Lutheran church that is the most extensive faith community in the country – historically excluded LGBTQ+ individuals, denying them the opportunity from joining the clergy or to marry in church. Back in the 1950s, the church’s bishops described gay people as “a global-scale societal hazard”.

Yet, with Norwegian society turning more progressive, becoming the second in the world to allow same-sex registered partnerships in 1993 and during 2009 the first Scandinavian country to approve gay marriage, the church gradually changed.

In 2007, the Church of Norway commenced the ordination of gay pastors, and same-sex couples have been able to have church weddings from 2017 onward. Last year, Tveit participated in Oslo’s Pride parade in what was called an unprecedented step for the church.

The apology on Thursday received differing opinions. The head of a network of Christian lesbians in Norway, Pedersen-Eriksen, who is also a gay pastor, referred to it as “a crucial act of amends” and a moment that “finally marked the end of a painful era within the church's past”.

According to Stephen Adom, the leader of the Association for Gender and Sexual Diversity in Norway, the apology represented “strong and important” but arrived “not in time for those among us who died of Aids … carrying heavy hearts as the church regarded the epidemic to be God’s punishment”.

Internationally, several faith-based organizations have tried to make amends for historical treatment concerning the LGBTQ+ community. Last year, England's church expressed regret for what it described as “disgraceful” conduct, although it continues to refuse to allow same-sex marriages within the church.

Likewise, Ireland's Methodist Church last year expressed regret for its “failures in pastoral support and care” to LGBTQ+ people and family members, but held fast in its belief that matrimony must only constitute a bond between male and female.

Several months ago, the United Church of Canada issued an apology to two spirit and LGBTQIA+ communities, characterizing it as a reaffirmation of its “pledge to complete acceptance and open hospitality” throughout every area of church life.

“We have failed to celebrate and delight in the wonderful diversity of creation,” Reverend Blair, the top administrative leader of the church, stated. “We have wounded people rather than pursuing healing. We express our regret.”