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Against crimson theater drapes at a leading Oslo LGBTQ+ venue, the Norwegian Lutheran Church issued a formal apology for harm and unequal treatment caused by the church.

“The national church has brought LGBTQ+ people shame, great harm and pain,” bishop Olav Fykse Tveit, Olav Fykse Tveit, declared this Thursday. “This should never have happened and which is the reason I offer my apology now.”

“Unequal treatment, harassment and discrimination” had caused some to lose their faith, Tveit recognized. A religious service at Oslo Cathedral was arranged to take place after his statement.

This formal apology occurred at a venue called London Pub, one of 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 swore loyalty to Islamic State, received a sentence to no less than 30 years behind bars for the killings.

In common with various worldwide religions, the Church of Norway – a Lutheran evangelical community that is the most extensive faith community in the country – for years sidelined LGBTQ+ individuals, refusing to allow them from joining the clergy or to marry in church. During the 1950s, the church’s bishops referred to homosexual individuals as a “social danger of global proportions”.

But as Norwegian society became increasingly liberal, ranking as the second globally to allow same-sex registered partnerships back in 1993 and by 2009 the initial Nordic nation to legalize same-sex marriage, the church slowly followed.

During 2007, Norway's church started appointing gay pastors, and same-sex couples could get married in religious ceremonies from 2017 onward. In 2023, the bishop took part in Oslo’s Pride parade in what was noted as a first for the church.

Thursday’s apology elicited a mixed reaction. The head of a network for Christian lesbians in Norway, Pedersen-Eriksen, a lesbian minister herself, called it “a crucial act of amends” and a point in time that “finally marked the end of a difficult period within the church's past”.

For Stephen Adom, the head of Norway’s Association for Gender and Sexual Diversity, the apology was “powerful and significant” but arrived “overdue for individuals among us who died of Aids … carrying heavy hearts as the church regarded the disease to be God’s punishment”.

Globally, several faith-based organizations have tried to offer apologies for their actions towards LGBTQ+ people. During 2023, the Church of England said sorry for what it referred to as “shameful” actions, though it continues to refuse to authorize same-sex weddings in church.

In a similar vein, the Methodist Church in Ireland last year apologised for “inadequate pastoral assistance and care” regarding the LGBTQ+ community and family members, but stayed firm in the view that marriage should only represent a partnership of one man and one woman.

Earlier this year, the United Church of Canada delivered a statement of regret toward Two-Spirit and LGBTQIA+ individuals, labeling it a reaffirmation of its “pledge to complete acceptance and open hospitality” in all aspects of church life.

“We have failed to celebrate and delight in the beauty of all creation,” Michael Blair, the top administrative leader of the church, stated. “We have hurt individuals in place of fostering completeness. We express our regret.”