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Set against crimson theater drapes at a well-known Oslo location for LGBTQ+ gatherings, Norway's national church expressed regret for hurtful actions and exclusion perpetrated over the years.

“The national church has inflicted LGBTQ+ individuals shame, great harm and pain,” the presiding bishop, Bishop Tveit, stated on Thursday. “This ought not to have occurred and which is the reason I offer my apology now.”

The “discrimination, unequal treatment and harassment” resulted in certain individuals abandoning their faith, Tveit recognized. A worship service at Oslo's main cathedral was scheduled to come after the apology.

The apology took place at the London Pub, one among two bars targeted in the 2022 shooting that resulted in two deaths and left nine seriously injured throughout the Oslo Pride festivities. A Norwegian citizen originally from Iran, who had pledged allegiance to Islamic State, received a sentence to no less than 30 years in prison for the murders.

Like many religions around the world, Norway's church – a Protestant Lutheran denomination that is Norway’s largest faith community – for years sidelined LGBTQ+ individuals, refusing to allow them from serving as pastors or to have church weddings. Back in the 1950s, church leaders referred to homosexual individuals as “a worldwide social threat”.

However, as Norway's society grew more liberal, ranking as the second globally to legalize same-sex partnerships back in 1993 and in 2009 the first Scandinavian country to legalize same-sex marriage, the church slowly followed.

In 2007, the Norwegian Lutheran Church began ordaining LGBTQ+ clergy, and LGBTQ+ partners have been able to get married in religious ceremonies from 2017 onward. During 2023, Tveit participated in the Oslo Pride event in what was described as an unprecedented step for the church.

Thursday’s apology received differing opinions. The leader of an organization of Christian lesbians in Norway, Pedersen-Eriksen, herself a gay pastor, described it as “a significant step toward healing” and a point in time that “represented the closure of a painful era in the history of the church”.

For Stephen Adom, the head of Norway’s Association for Gender and Sexual Diversity, the statement was “meaningful and vital” but was delivered “not in time for those who passed away from AIDS … with deep sorrow in their hearts because the church considered the epidemic as divine punishment”.

Globally, a handful of religious institutions have tried to make amends for their past behavior towards LGBTQ+ people. During 2023, the Church of England said sorry for what it characterized as “shameful” actions, although it still declines to permit gay marriages in church.

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 the view that marriage could only be a partnership of one man and one woman.

Several months ago, the United Church of Canada offered an apology to Two-Spirit and LGBTQIA+ groups, labeling it a renewed commitment of its “pledge to complete acceptance and open hospitality” in every part of the church's activities.

“We have failed to honor and appreciate the beauty of all creation,” Michael Blair, the top administrative leader of the church, said. “We have hurt individuals in place of fostering completeness. We apologize.”