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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 hurtful actions and exclusion it had inflicted.

“Norway's church has brought LGBTQ+ individuals harm, suffering and humiliation,” bishop Olav Fykse Tveit, Olav Fykse Tveit, announced this Thursday. “This should never have happened and that is why I apologise today.”

“Harassment, discrimination and unfair treatment” led to certain individuals abandoning their faith, Tveit acknowledged. A worship service at the cathedral in Oslo was scheduled to follow his apology.

The statement of regret took place at the London Pub, a bar that was one of two attacked during the 2022 attack that killed two people and injured nine people severely throughout the Oslo Pride festivities. A Norwegian of Iranian origin, who had pledged allegiance to Islamic State, received a sentence to no less than 30 years in incarceration for carrying out the attacks.

In common with various worldwide religions, the Norwegian Lutheran Church – a Protestant Lutheran denomination that is the most extensive faith community in the country – had long marginalised the LGBTQ+ community, preventing them from serving as pastors or to marry in church. Back in the 1950s, bishops of the church described gay people as “a worldwide social threat”.

But as Norwegian society became increasingly liberal, becoming the second in the world to allow same-sex registered partnerships in 1993 and by 2009 the initial Nordic nation to legalize same-sex marriage, the church gradually changed.

In 2007, the Church of Norway started appointing homosexual ministers, and LGBTQ+ partners were permitted to marry in church from 2017 onward. During 2023, Tveit joined in Oslo’s Pride parade in what was noted as an unprecedented step for the church.

The apology on Thursday was met with a mixed reaction. The director of a group of Christian lesbians in Norway, Hanne Marie Pedersen-Eriksen, herself a gay pastor, called it “an important reparation” and an occasion that “finally marked the end of a dark chapter in the church’s history”.

According to Stephen Adom, the leader of the Association for Gender and Sexual Diversity in Norway, the statement was “powerful and significant” but had come “too late for those among us who died of Aids … with deep sorrow in their hearts because the church considered the crisis to be God’s punishment”.

Globally, several faith-based organizations have attempted to make amends for historical treatment regarding LGBTQ+ individuals. Last year, the Church of England said sorry for what it characterized as “shameful” actions, though it persists in refusing to permit gay marriages within the church.

Similarly, Ireland's Methodist Church last year apologised for “inadequate pastoral assistance and care” regarding the LGBTQ+ community and their families, but held fast in the view that marriage could only be a bond between male and female.

In the early part of this year, the United Church based in Canada issued an apology to Two-Spirit and LGBTQIA+ groups, labeling it a confirmation of the church's “dedication to welcoming all and full inclusion” in all aspects of church life.

“We have not succeeded to celebrate and delight in all of your beautiful creation,” Michael Blair, the general secretary of the church, remarked. “We have hurt individuals rather than pursuing healing. We are sorry.”