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Amid crimson theater drapes at a well-known Oslo location for LGBTQ+ gatherings, the Norwegian Lutheran Church expressed regret for harm and unequal treatment perpetrated over the years.

“The church in Norway has caused LGBTQ+ people shame, great harm and pain,” the presiding bishop, Bishop Tveit, declared this Thursday. “This ought not to have occurred and which is the reason I offer my apology now.”

The “discrimination, unequal treatment and harassment” had caused a loss of faith for some, the bishop admitted. A church service at the cathedral in Oslo was scheduled to come after the apology.

The statement of regret took place at the London Pub, a bar that was one of two targeted in the 2022 shooting that took two lives and caused serious injuries to nine throughout the Oslo Pride festivities. A Norwegian of Iranian origin, who expressed support for ISIS, was sentenced to no less than 30 years behind bars 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 – for years sidelined the LGBTQ+ community, refusing to allow them to become pastors or to have church weddings. In the 1950s, bishops of the church described gay people as “a global-scale societal hazard”.

Yet, with Norwegian society turning more progressive, emerging as the world's second to permit registered partnerships for same-sex couples during 1993 and by 2009 the first Scandinavian country to allow same-sex marriage, the church gradually changed.

Back in 2007, the Church of Norway commenced the ordination of homosexual ministers, and LGBTQ+ partners were permitted to get married in religious ceremonies from 2017 onward. In 2023, Tveit participated in Oslo’s Pride parade in what was noted as a historic moment for the religious institution.

The apology on Thursday received differing opinions. The director of a group for 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 “finally marked the end of a dark chapter in the church’s history”.

For Stephen Adom, the leader of the Association for Gender and Sexual Diversity in Norway, the apology was “powerful and significant” but was delivered “overdue for individuals who passed away from AIDS … carrying heavy hearts since the church viewed the disease to be God’s punishment”.

Worldwide, a handful of religious institutions have tried to make amends for their actions concerning the LGBTQ+ community. Last year, the Church of England expressed regret for what it referred to as “shameful” actions, though it persists in refusing to permit gay marriages within the church.

Likewise, the Methodist Church located in Ireland last year issued an apology for its “failures in pastoral support and care” regarding the LGBTQ+ community and their relatives, but stayed firm in the view that matrimony must only constitute a bond between male and female.

Several months ago, the United Church of Canada delivered a statement of regret to Two-Spirit and LGBTQIA+ groups, labeling it a confirmation of the church’s “commitment to radical hospitality and full inclusion” in all aspects of church life.

“We did not manage to celebrate and delight in the wonderful diversity of creation,” Reverend Blair, the general secretary of the church, remarked. “We caused pain to people rather than pursuing healing. We express our regret.”