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Amid deep red curtains at a well-known Oslo location for LGBTQ+ gatherings, the Church of Norway expressed regret for harm and unequal treatment it had inflicted.

“The church in Norway has brought LGBTQ+ individuals pain, shame and significant harm,” the lead bishop, Bishop Tveit, announced this Thursday. “This ought not to have occurred and which is the reason I apologise today.”

“Harassment, discrimination and unfair treatment” had caused some to lose their faith, Tveit recognized. A worship service at Oslo's main cathedral was planned to come after the apology.

This formal apology was delivered at the London Pub, one among two bars involved in the 2022 shooting that took two lives and left nine seriously injured at Oslo's Pride event. An individual of Iranian descent living in Norway, who swore loyalty to Islamic State, received a sentence 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 most extensive faith community in the country – historically excluded LGBTQ+ individuals, denying them the opportunity to become pastors or from marrying in religious ceremonies. During the 1950s, bishops of the church characterized LGBTQ+ persons as a “social danger of global proportions”.

But as Norwegian society became increasingly liberal, emerging as the world's second to permit registered partnerships for same-sex couples in 1993 and by 2009 the first Scandinavian country to legalize same-sex marriage, the church slowly followed.

In 2007, the Church of Norway commenced the ordination of homosexual ministers, and same-sex couples could get married in religious ceremonies from 2017 onward. Last year, Tveit joined in the Pride march in Oslo in what was described as a first for the church.

The apology on Thursday was met with varied responses. The director of a group of Christian lesbians in Norway, Pedersen-Eriksen, herself a gay pastor, called it “a significant step toward healing” and a point in time that “signaled the conclusion of a difficult period in the church’s history”.

As stated by Stephen Adom, the head of the Association for Gender and Sexual Diversity in Norway, the statement was “strong and important” but arrived “not in time for those among us who died of Aids … carrying heavy hearts because the church considered the disease as divine punishment”.

Worldwide, several faith-based organizations have tried to reconcile for their past behavior towards LGBTQ+ people. During 2023, England's church said sorry for what it described as “shameful” actions, even as it still declines to permit gay marriages in church.

Similarly, Ireland's Methodist Church the previous year apologised for “shortcomings in pastoral care and support” regarding the LGBTQ+ community and their families, but held fast in the view that matrimony must only constitute a union between a man and a woman.

Several months ago, the United Church of Canada offered 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 rejoice and take pleasure in the beauty of all creation,” Michael Blair, the church's general secretary, remarked. “We have wounded people instead of seeking wholeness. We express our regret.”