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Against crimson theater drapes at a well-known Oslo location for LGBTQ+ gatherings, Norway's national church issued a formal apology for harm and unequal treatment it had inflicted.

“The national church has brought LGBTQ+ individuals shame, great harm and pain,” bishop Olav Fykse Tveit, Olav Fykse Tveit, stated during a Thursday event. “This should never have happened and this is why today I say sorry.”

“Unequal treatment, harassment and discrimination” led to certain individuals abandoning their faith, Tveit recognized. A church service at the cathedral in Oslo was arranged to come after the apology.

The apology occurred at the London Pub establishment, a bar that was one of two involved in the 2022 shooting that took two lives and injured nine people severely during Oslo’s Pride celebrations. A Norwegian citizen originally from Iran, who swore loyalty to Islamic State, was sentenced to at least 30 years behind bars for the killings.

In common with various worldwide religions, the Norwegian Lutheran Church – a Lutheran evangelical community that is Norway’s largest faith community – historically excluded the LGBTQ+ community, refusing to allow them to become pastors or from marrying in religious ceremonies. In the 1950s, the church’s bishops referred to homosexual individuals as “a worldwide social threat”.

But as Norwegian society became increasingly liberal, becoming the second in the world to allow same-sex registered partnerships back in 1993 and by 2009 the first Scandinavian country to allow same-sex marriage, the church gradually changed.

In 2007, Norway's church commenced the ordination of homosexual ministers, and LGBTQ+ partners have been able to get married in religious ceremonies from 2017 onward. Last year, Tveit joined in the Oslo Pride event in what was described as a historic moment for the religious institution.

Thursday’s apology received differing opinions. The director of a group for Christian lesbians in Norway, Hanne Marie, herself a gay pastor, referred to it as “a crucial act of amends” and an occasion that “signaled the conclusion of a painful era in the history of the church”.

As stated by Stephen Adom, the leader of the Norwegian Association for Gender and Sexual Diversity, the statement was “strong and important” but arrived “too late for those among us who died of Aids … with hearts filled with anguish because the church considered the epidemic to be God’s punishment”.

Internationally, several faith-based organizations have tried to make amends for historical treatment regarding LGBTQ+ individuals. Last year, the Anglican Church expressed regret for what it described as its “shameful” treatment, even as it continues to refuse to permit gay marriages within the church.

Likewise, Ireland's Methodist Church last year expressed regret for “shortcomings in pastoral care and support” regarding the LGBTQ+ community and their relatives, but stayed firm in the view that marriage could only be a union between a man and a woman.

Several months ago, the United Church of Canada issued an apology to Two-Spirit and LGBTQIA+ groups, labeling it a renewed commitment of the church's “dedication to welcoming all and full inclusion” throughout every area of church life.

“We have not succeeded to honor and appreciate the beauty of all creation,” Reverend Blair, the top administrative leader of the church, remarked. “We have wounded people instead of seeking wholeness. We express our regret.”