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Amid crimson theater drapes at one of Oslo’s most prominent LGBTQ+ spaces, the Norwegian Lutheran Church offered an apology for discrimination and harm caused by the church.

“The national church has caused LGBTQ+ people harm, suffering and humiliation,” the presiding bishop, the church leader, announced on Thursday. “This ought not to have occurred and that is why I offer my apology now.”

“Harassment, discrimination and unfair treatment” had caused a loss of faith for some, Tveit acknowledged. A church service at the cathedral in Oslo was arranged to take place after his statement.

The statement of regret occurred at the London Pub establishment, a bar that was one of two attacked during the 2022 violent incident that resulted in two deaths and left nine seriously injured throughout the Oslo Pride festivities. A Norwegian of Iranian origin, who expressed support for ISIS, was given a prison term to a minimum of three decades in prison for the killings.

Like many religions around the world, Norway's church – a Lutheran evangelical community that is the most extensive faith community in the country – had long marginalised LGBTQ+ individuals, denying them the opportunity to become pastors or to have church weddings. During the 1950s, bishops of the church described gay people as “a global-scale societal hazard”.

But as Norwegian society became increasingly liberal, becoming the second in the world to legalize same-sex partnerships back in 1993 and in 2009 the first in Scandinavia to approve gay marriage, the church slowly followed.

Back in 2007, the Church of Norway started appointing homosexual ministers, and same-sex couples could have church weddings from 2017 onward. In 2023, Tveit joined in Oslo’s Pride parade in what was described as an unprecedented step for the church.

The apology on Thursday elicited differing opinions. The leader of an organization of 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 difficult period in the church’s history”.

According to Stephen Adom, the leader of the Norwegian Association for Gender and Sexual Diversity, the apology represented “meaningful and vital” but arrived “not in time for those among us who died of Aids … with deep sorrow in their hearts since the church viewed the crisis as divine punishment”.

Globally, a few churches have tried to make amends for their actions towards LGBTQ+ people. During 2023, the Church of England apologised for what it characterized as “disgraceful” conduct, although it continues to refuse to allow same-sex marriages in church.

In a similar vein, the Methodist Church located in Ireland the previous year issued an apology for its “failures in pastoral support and care” to LGBTQ+ people and their relatives, but stayed firm in its belief that marriage should only represent a bond between male and female.

Earlier this year, Canada's United Church delivered a statement of regret to two spirit and LGBTQIA+ communities, labeling it a reaffirmation of its “pledge to complete acceptance and open hospitality” in every part of the church's activities.

“We did not manage to rejoice and take pleasure in the wonderful diversity of creation,” Reverend Blair, the top administrative leader of the church, remarked. “We caused pain to people instead of seeking wholeness. We apologize.”