🔗 Share this article

Against red stage curtains at a well-known Oslo location for LGBTQ+ gatherings, the Church of Norway expressed regret for hurtful actions and exclusion perpetrated over the years.

“The church in Norway has inflicted the LGBTQ+ community pain, shame and significant harm,” the lead bishop, the church leader, announced during a Thursday event. “It was wrong for this to take place and that is why I apologise today.”

“Unequal treatment, harassment and discrimination” resulted in certain individuals abandoning their faith, Tveit recognized. A church service at Oslo Cathedral was arranged to take place after his statement.

This formal apology was delivered at a venue called London Pub, one among two bars targeted in the 2022 violent incident that killed two people and caused serious injuries to nine at Oslo's Pride event. A Norwegian citizen originally from Iran, who expressed support for ISIS, received a sentence to no less than 30 years in prison for the murders.

Like many religions around the world, the Norwegian Lutheran Church – an evangelical Lutheran church that is Norway’s largest faith community – for years sidelined LGBTQ+ individuals, preventing them from joining the clergy or to have church weddings. During the 1950s, church leaders referred to homosexual individuals as a “social danger of global proportions”.

Yet, with Norwegian society turning more progressive, ranking as the second globally to legalize same-sex partnerships during 1993 and in 2009 the first in Scandinavia to approve gay marriage, the church slowly followed.

In 2007, the Norwegian Lutheran Church started appointing LGBTQ+ clergy, and gay and lesbian couples could have church weddings from 2017 onward. During 2023, the bishop took part in Oslo’s Pride parade in what was noted as a historic moment for the religious institution.

The apology on Thursday received differing opinions. The head of a network for Christian lesbians in Norway, Pedersen-Eriksen, a lesbian minister herself, described it as “an important reparation” and a moment that “signaled the conclusion of a painful era in the church’s history”.

According to Stephen Adom, the director of Norway’s Association for Gender and Sexual Diversity, the apology was “powerful and significant” but arrived “not in time for those who passed away from AIDS … carrying heavy hearts as the church regarded the epidemic as punishment from God”.

Internationally, a handful of religious institutions have sought to offer apologies for their past behavior regarding LGBTQ+ individuals. Last year, England's church said sorry for what it described as “disgraceful” conduct, although it continues to refuse to authorize same-sex weddings in church.

Likewise, the Methodist Church located in Ireland in the past year issued an apology for its “failures in pastoral support and care” regarding the LGBTQ+ community and family members, but remained staunch in its conviction that marriage should only represent a partnership of one man and one woman.

Several months ago, the United Church based in Canada delivered a statement of regret to two spirit and LGBTQIA+ communities, describing it as a confirmation of the church's “dedication to welcoming all and full inclusion” throughout every area of church life.

“We have failed to honor and appreciate all of your beautiful creation,” Michael Blair, the church's general secretary, said. “We have wounded people instead of seeking wholeness. We express our regret.”