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Set against deep red curtains at one of Oslo’s most prominent LGBTQ+ spaces, Norway's national church offered an apology for discrimination and harm perpetrated over the years.

“Norway's church has inflicted LGBTQ+ individuals shame, great harm and pain,” the lead bishop, the church leader, stated this Thursday. “It was wrong for this to take place and which is the reason today I say sorry.”

“Unequal treatment, harassment and discrimination” led to a loss of faith for some, Tveit acknowledged. A worship service at Oslo Cathedral was arranged to take place after his statement.

The statement of regret took place at a venue called London Pub, one of two bars attacked during the 2022 shooting that killed two people and left nine seriously injured during Oslo’s Pride celebrations. A Norwegian of Iranian origin, who swore loyalty to Islamic State, was sentenced to a minimum of three decades behind bars for the murders.

Like many religions around the world, Norway's church – a Protestant Lutheran denomination that is the most extensive faith community in the country – had long marginalised LGBTQ+ individuals, preventing them from joining the clergy or from marrying in religious ceremonies. During the 1950s, bishops of the church described gay people 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 in 1993 and in 2009 the first Scandinavian country to allow same-sex marriage, the religious institution eventually adapted.

During 2007, Norway's church started appointing gay pastors, and LGBTQ+ partners could have church weddings starting in 2017. In 2023, the bishop took part in the Oslo Pride event in what was described as an unprecedented step for the church.

Thursday’s apology received differing opinions. The head of a network for Christian lesbians in Norway, Pedersen-Eriksen, herself a gay pastor, called it “a significant step toward healing” and a point in time that “signaled the conclusion of a difficult period in the church’s history”.

According to Stephen Adom, the leader of Norway’s Association for Gender and Sexual Diversity, the statement was “strong and important” but was delivered “not in time for those among us who died of Aids … with deep sorrow in their hearts since the church viewed the disease as divine punishment”.

Internationally, several faith-based organizations have attempted to offer apologies for their past behavior concerning the LGBTQ+ community. During 2023, England's church said sorry for what it described as “disgraceful” conduct, although it still declines to permit gay marriages in religious settings.

Likewise, the Methodist Church in Ireland the previous year apologised for “shortcomings in pastoral care and support” to LGBTQ+ people and their relatives, but held fast in the view that matrimony must only constitute a partnership of one man and one woman.

In the early part of this year, Canada's United Church issued an apology toward Two-Spirit and LGBTQIA+ individuals, characterizing it as a reaffirmation of its “pledge to complete acceptance and open hospitality” throughout every area of church life.

“We did not manage to rejoice and take pleasure in all of your beautiful creation,” Michael Blair, the top administrative leader of the church, remarked. “We have wounded people in place of fostering completeness. We are sorry.”