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Amid crimson theater drapes at one of Oslo’s most prominent LGBTQ+ spaces, the Norwegian Lutheran Church offered an apology for harm and unequal treatment caused by the church.

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

“Unequal treatment, harassment and discrimination” resulted in certain individuals abandoning their faith, Tveit acknowledged. A religious service at Oslo's main cathedral was arranged to follow his apology.

The statement of regret was delivered at a venue called London Pub, a bar that was one of two targeted in the 2022 violent incident that resulted in two deaths and left nine seriously injured during Oslo’s Pride celebrations. An individual of Iranian descent living in Norway, who had pledged allegiance to Islamic State, was given a prison term to at least 30 years in incarceration for carrying out the attacks.

Like many religions around the world, the Norwegian Lutheran Church – a Lutheran evangelical community that is the most extensive faith community in the country – had long marginalised the LGBTQ+ community, refusing to allow them from serving as pastors or to have church weddings. Back in the 1950s, church leaders referred to homosexual individuals as “a global-scale societal hazard”.

However, as Norway's society grew more liberal, ranking as the second globally to permit registered partnerships for same-sex couples during 1993 and in 2009 the initial Nordic nation to legalize same-sex marriage, the church slowly followed.

Back in 2007, the Church of Norway began ordaining homosexual ministers, and gay and lesbian couples could marry in church starting in 2017. During 2023, the bishop took part in the Pride march in Oslo in what was described as a historic moment for the religious institution.

Thursday’s apology was met with varied responses. The leader of an organization representing Norwegian Christian lesbians, Pedersen-Eriksen, a lesbian minister herself, described it as “a significant step toward healing” and an occasion that “finally marked the end of a painful era within the church's past”.

According to Stephen Adom, the director of Norway’s Association for Gender and Sexual Diversity, the apology represented “powerful and significant” but had come “overdue for individuals among us who died of Aids … carrying heavy hearts as the church regarded the epidemic as punishment from God”.

Globally, a few churches have sought to reconcile for their past behavior regarding LGBTQ+ individuals. Last year, England's church expressed regret for what it characterized as its “shameful” treatment, although it persists in refusing to permit gay marriages in religious settings.

Likewise, the Methodist Church in Ireland last year expressed regret for its “failures in pastoral support and care” to LGBTQ+ people and their relatives, but remained staunch in its conviction that marriage should only represent a union between a man and a woman.

In the early part of this year, the United Church based in Canada offered an apology to Two-Spirit and LGBTQIA+ groups, labeling it a renewed commitment of the church’s “commitment to radical hospitality and full inclusion” throughout every area of church life.

“We have not succeeded to honor and appreciate the beauty of all creation,” Rev Michael Blair, the general secretary of the church, stated. “We have wounded people rather than pursuing healing. We are sorry.”