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Against red stage curtains at a leading Oslo LGBTQ+ venue, the Norwegian Lutheran Church expressed regret for discrimination and harm it had inflicted.

“The church in Norway has brought LGBTQ+ individuals pain, shame and significant harm,” the lead bishop, Bishop Tveit, stated on Thursday. “It was wrong for this to take place and which is the reason today I say sorry.”

The “discrimination, unequal treatment and harassment” led to certain individuals abandoning their faith, the bishop admitted. A church service at Oslo Cathedral was scheduled to take place after his statement.

This formal apology took place at the London Pub establishment, one among two bars targeted in the 2022 attack that killed two people and left nine seriously injured at Oslo's Pride event. A Norwegian citizen originally from Iran, who swore loyalty to Islamic State, was sentenced to at least 30 years in incarceration 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 the LGBTQ+ community, preventing them to become pastors or to marry in church. Back in the 1950s, the church’s bishops referred to homosexual individuals as “a global-scale societal hazard”.

Yet, with Norwegian society turning more progressive, ranking as the second globally to allow same-sex registered partnerships in 1993 and during 2009 the first Scandinavian country to legalize same-sex marriage, the church slowly followed.

During 2007, Norway's church started appointing gay pastors, and LGBTQ+ partners were permitted to have church weddings since 2017. In 2023, Tveit participated in the Pride march in Oslo in what was called a first for the church.

Thursday’s apology received differing opinions. The leader of an organization for Christian lesbians in Norway, Hanne Marie Pedersen-Eriksen, herself a gay pastor, called it “an important reparation” and a moment that “finally marked the end of a difficult period within the church's past”.

As stated by Stephen Adom, the head of the Association for Gender and Sexual Diversity in Norway, the apology was “strong and important” but was delivered “too late for those who passed away from AIDS … with deep sorrow in their hearts because the church considered the disease as divine punishment”.

Worldwide, a few churches have tried to offer apologies for historical treatment towards LGBTQ+ people. Last year, England's church apologised for what it characterized as its “shameful” treatment, although it persists in refusing to permit gay marriages in religious settings.

Similarly, Ireland's Methodist Church last year apologised for its “failures in pastoral support and care” toward LGBTQ+ individuals and their families, but held fast in the view that matrimony must only constitute a union between a man and a woman.

Earlier this year, the United Church based in Canada delivered a statement of regret toward Two-Spirit and LGBTQIA+ individuals, characterizing it as a renewed commitment of the church’s “commitment to radical hospitality and full inclusion” throughout every area of church life.

“We have failed to rejoice and take pleasure in all of your beautiful creation,” Michael Blair, the church's general secretary, stated. “We have wounded people instead of seeking wholeness. We express our regret.”