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Set against crimson theater drapes at a leading Oslo LGBTQ+ venue, the Church of Norway expressed regret for harm and unequal treatment caused by the church.

“The church in Norway has inflicted LGBTQ+ people pain, shame and significant harm,” bishop Olav Fykse Tveit, the church leader, declared during a Thursday event. “This ought not to have occurred and this 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 Oslo Cathedral was planned to follow his apology.

The apology was delivered at the London Pub establishment, a bar that was one of two involved in the 2022 attack that killed two people and caused serious injuries to nine 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 murders.

In common with various worldwide religions, the Norwegian Lutheran Church – a Lutheran evangelical community that is the most extensive faith community in the country – for years sidelined the LGBTQ+ community, refusing to allow them to become pastors or to marry in church. During the 1950s, the church’s bishops described gay people as “a worldwide social threat”.

However, as Norway's society grew more liberal, becoming the second in the world to legalize same-sex partnerships during 1993 and during 2009 the first in Scandinavia to allow same-sex marriage, the religious institution eventually adapted.

Back in 2007, the Church of Norway began ordaining gay pastors, and gay and lesbian couples could have church weddings from 2017 onward. In 2023, Tveit joined in the Oslo Pride event in what was noted as a first for the church.

Thursday’s apology was met with differing opinions. The leader of an organization for Christian lesbians in Norway, Hanne Marie Pedersen-Eriksen, herself a gay pastor, described it as “a crucial act of amends” and an occasion that “signaled the conclusion of a dark chapter in the history of the church”.

For Stephen Adom, the director of the Norwegian Association for Gender and Sexual Diversity, the apology was “strong and important” but was delivered “overdue for individuals who passed away from AIDS … with deep sorrow in their hearts because the church considered the epidemic as divine punishment”.

Internationally, a handful of religious institutions have sought to reconcile for their actions towards LGBTQ+ people. Last year, England's church said sorry for what it characterized as its “shameful” treatment, though it persists in refusing to allow same-sex marriages in religious settings.

Similarly, the Methodist Church located in Ireland last year issued an apology for its “failures in pastoral support and care” toward LGBTQ+ individuals and family members, but remained staunch in the view that marriage should only represent a partnership of one man and one woman.

In the early part of this year, Canada's United Church issued an apology toward Two-Spirit and LGBTQIA+ individuals, describing it as a confirmation of the church's “dedication to welcoming all and full inclusion” in every part of the church's activities.

“We have failed to rejoice and take pleasure in the wonderful diversity of creation,” Michael Blair, the general secretary of the church, said. “We have wounded people rather than pursuing healing. We express our regret.”