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Against crimson theater drapes at a leading Oslo LGBTQ+ venue, Norway's national church issued a formal apology for harm and unequal treatment it had inflicted.

“The national church has brought LGBTQ+ people harm, suffering and humiliation,” the lead bishop, Bishop Tveit, announced on Thursday. “This ought not to have occurred and this is why I apologise today.”

The “discrimination, unequal treatment and harassment” led to some to lose their faith, Tveit acknowledged. A religious service at the cathedral in Oslo was arranged to follow his apology.

The statement of regret occurred at a venue called London Pub, one of two bars attacked during the 2022 attack that resulted in two deaths and caused serious injuries to nine during Oslo’s Pride celebrations. A Norwegian of Iranian origin, who had pledged allegiance to Islamic State, was sentenced to no less than 30 years behind bars for carrying out the attacks.

Similar to numerous global faiths, the Norwegian Lutheran Church – a Lutheran evangelical community that is Norway’s largest faith community – for years sidelined the LGBTQ+ community, preventing them from serving as pastors or to have church weddings. Back in the 1950s, the church’s bishops characterized LGBTQ+ persons as “a worldwide social threat”.

Yet, with Norwegian society turning more progressive, emerging as the world's second to allow same-sex registered partnerships in 1993 and during 2009 the first Scandinavian country to allow same-sex marriage, the religious institution eventually adapted.

In 2007, Norway's church commenced the ordination of LGBTQ+ clergy, and LGBTQ+ partners were permitted to have church weddings since 2017. During 2023, Tveit participated in the Oslo Pride event in what was noted as a historic moment for the religious institution.

Thursday’s apology elicited a mixed reaction. The leader of an organization representing Norwegian Christian lesbians, Pedersen-Eriksen, a lesbian minister herself, called it “an important reparation” and a moment that “finally marked the end of a painful era in the church’s history”.

As stated by Stephen Adom, the head of Norway’s Association for Gender and Sexual Diversity, the apology was “powerful and significant” but had come “not in time for those who passed away from AIDS … with hearts filled with anguish as the church regarded the disease to be God’s punishment”.

Worldwide, a handful of religious institutions have sought to offer apologies for historical treatment towards LGBTQ+ people. In 2023, the Church of England expressed regret for what it referred to as its “shameful” treatment, though it still declines to authorize same-sex weddings in religious settings.

Likewise, the Methodist Church in Ireland in the past year expressed regret for “shortcomings in pastoral care and support” toward LGBTQ+ individuals and family members, but remained staunch in its belief 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 to Two-Spirit and LGBTQIA+ groups, characterizing it as a reaffirmation of its “pledge to complete acceptance and open hospitality” in every part of the church's activities.

“We have failed to celebrate and delight in the beauty of all creation,” Michael Blair, the general secretary of the church, stated. “We have hurt individuals in place of fostering completeness. We apologize.”