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Amid crimson theater drapes at one of Oslo’s most prominent LGBTQ+ spaces, Norway's national church issued a formal apology for discrimination and harm perpetrated over the years.

“The national church has brought LGBTQ+ people pain, shame and significant harm,” bishop Olav Fykse Tveit, Bishop Tveit, stated this Thursday. “This ought not to have occurred and which is the reason today I say sorry.”

“Harassment, discrimination and unfair treatment” had caused a loss of faith for some, the bishop admitted. A worship service at Oslo Cathedral was planned to take place after his statement.

The apology was delivered at a venue called London Pub, one of two bars attacked during the 2022 shooting that took two lives and injured nine people severely throughout the Oslo Pride festivities. An individual of Iranian descent living in Norway, who swore loyalty to Islamic State, was given a prison term to no less than 30 years in prison for the killings.

Similar to numerous global faiths, the Church of Norway – a Protestant Lutheran denomination that is the biggest religious group in Norway – historically excluded the LGBTQ+ community, preventing them to become pastors or from marrying in religious ceremonies. Back in the 1950s, church leaders described gay people as “a worldwide social threat”.

But as Norwegian society became increasingly liberal, emerging as the world's second to legalize same-sex partnerships in 1993 and during 2009 the initial Nordic nation to allow same-sex marriage, the church slowly followed.

Back in 2007, the Church of Norway began ordaining LGBTQ+ clergy, and gay and lesbian couples were permitted to marry in church since 2017. During 2023, Tveit joined in the Pride march in Oslo in what was called a first for the church.

Thursday’s apology received a mixed reaction. The head of a network for Christian lesbians in Norway, Hanne Marie Pedersen-Eriksen, who is also a gay pastor, described it as “a significant step toward healing” and a point in time that “represented the closure of a difficult period in the church’s history”.

For Stephen Adom, the director of the Association for Gender and Sexual Diversity in Norway, the apology was “strong and important” but had come “too late for those who passed away from AIDS … with hearts filled with anguish since the church viewed the epidemic as divine punishment”.

Worldwide, a few churches have attempted to make amends for historical treatment towards LGBTQ+ people. During 2023, England's church apologised for what it referred to as “shameful” actions, even as it continues to refuse to allow same-sex marriages in church.

Similarly, the Methodist Church located in Ireland the previous year apologised for “inadequate pastoral assistance and care” regarding the LGBTQ+ community and their relatives, but stayed firm in the view that marriage should only represent a partnership of one man and one woman.

In the early part of this year, the United Church of Canada offered an apology to two spirit and LGBTQIA+ communities, describing it as a renewed commitment of its “pledge to complete acceptance and open hospitality” in all aspects of church life.

“We have not succeeded to celebrate and delight in the wonderful diversity of creation,” Reverend Blair, the general secretary of the church, said. “We have hurt individuals instead of seeking wholeness. We express our regret.”