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Set against red stage curtains at a leading Oslo LGBTQ+ venue, Norway's national church expressed regret for harm and unequal treatment perpetrated over the years.

“Norway's church has brought the LGBTQ+ community harm, suffering and humiliation,” bishop Olav Fykse Tveit, Bishop Tveit, announced during a Thursday event. “This should never have happened and that is why today I say sorry.”

“Unequal treatment, harassment and discrimination” resulted in a loss of faith for some, Tveit recognized. A religious service at Oslo's main cathedral was scheduled to follow his apology.

The statement of regret took place at the London Pub establishment, a bar that was one of two involved in the 2022 attack that killed two people and caused serious injuries to nine during Oslo’s Pride celebrations. An individual of Iranian descent living in Norway, who swore loyalty to Islamic State, received a sentence to a minimum of three decades behind bars for carrying out the attacks.

In common with various worldwide religions, the Norwegian Lutheran Church – 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 from marrying in religious ceremonies. During the 1950s, church leaders referred to homosexual individuals as “a global-scale societal hazard”.

Yet, with Norwegian society turning more progressive, becoming the second in the world to legalize same-sex partnerships during 1993 and during 2009 the initial Nordic nation to legalize same-sex marriage, the church slowly followed.

In 2007, the Norwegian Lutheran Church commenced the ordination of homosexual ministers, and gay and lesbian couples have been able to marry in church starting in 2017. Last year, Tveit participated in the Pride march in Oslo in what was noted as an unprecedented step for the church.

The apology on Thursday was met with differing opinions. The head of a network of Christian lesbians in Norway, Hanne Marie Pedersen-Eriksen, herself a gay pastor, referred to it as “a crucial act of amends” and a point in time that “signaled the conclusion of a painful era in the history of the church”.

As stated by Stephen Adom, the head of the Norwegian Association for Gender and Sexual Diversity, the apology was “meaningful and vital” but had come “too late for those who lost their lives to AIDS … with hearts filled with anguish because the church considered the crisis as punishment from God”.

Worldwide, several faith-based organizations have sought to make amends for their actions towards LGBTQ+ people. In 2023, the Anglican Church said sorry for what it referred to as “shameful” actions, although it continues to refuse to allow same-sex marriages in church.

Similarly, the Methodist Church in Ireland last year issued an apology for “shortcomings in pastoral care and support” toward LGBTQ+ individuals and their relatives, but stayed firm in its conviction that matrimony must only constitute a bond between male and female.

Earlier this year, Canada's United Church delivered a statement of regret to two spirit and LGBTQIA+ communities, labeling it 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 general secretary of the church, stated. “We have wounded people instead of seeking wholeness. We are sorry.”