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Set against red stage curtains at one of Oslo’s most prominent LGBTQ+ spaces, the Norwegian Lutheran Church expressed regret for hurtful actions and exclusion caused by the church.

“Norway's church has caused LGBTQ+ individuals shame, great harm and pain,” the lead bishop, Bishop Tveit, stated on Thursday. “This should never have happened and that is why today I say sorry.”

“Unequal treatment, harassment and discrimination” had caused certain individuals abandoning their faith, the bishop admitted. A worship service at the cathedral in Oslo was planned to follow his apology.

This formal apology occurred at the London Pub establishment, one among two bars attacked during the 2022 shooting that killed two people and caused serious injuries to nine at Oslo's Pride event. An individual of Iranian descent living in Norway, who expressed support for ISIS, was sentenced to a minimum of three decades behind bars for the murders.

Similar to numerous global faiths, Norway's church – a Protestant Lutheran denomination that is Norway’s largest faith community – for years sidelined LGBTQ+ people, preventing them to become pastors or to marry in church. During the 1950s, the church’s bishops referred to homosexual individuals as “a worldwide social threat”.

Yet, with Norwegian society turning more progressive, emerging as the world's second to permit registered partnerships for same-sex couples in 1993 and in 2009 the first in Scandinavia to legalize same-sex marriage, the church slowly followed.

During 2007, the Church of Norway commenced the ordination of homosexual ministers, and same-sex couples were permitted to get married in religious ceremonies since 2017. During 2023, the bishop took part in Oslo’s Pride parade in what was called a historic moment for the religious institution.

The apology on Thursday elicited differing opinions. The director of a group for Christian lesbians in Norway, Pedersen-Eriksen, a lesbian minister herself, called it “a significant step toward healing” and an occasion that “signaled the conclusion of a painful era within the church's past”.

According to Stephen Adom, the leader of the Association for Gender and Sexual Diversity in Norway, the statement was “strong and important” but had come “not in time for those among us who died of Aids … with deep sorrow in their hearts since the church viewed the epidemic as divine punishment”.

Worldwide, several faith-based organizations have attempted to reconcile for their actions regarding LGBTQ+ individuals. During 2023, the Anglican Church apologised for what it referred to as its “shameful” treatment, even as it still declines to allow same-sex marriages in religious settings.

Likewise, the Methodist Church in Ireland last year issued an apology for its “failures in pastoral support and care” to LGBTQ+ people and their relatives, but held fast in the view that marriage should only represent a partnership of one man and one woman.

Earlier this year, the United Church based in Canada delivered a statement of regret to two spirit and LGBTQIA+ communities, describing it as a renewed commitment of the church's “dedication to welcoming all and full inclusion” in all aspects of church life.

“We have not succeeded to celebrate and delight in the wonderful diversity of creation,” Reverend Blair, the church's general secretary, remarked. “We have wounded people rather than pursuing healing. We apologize.”