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Set against red stage curtains at a leading Oslo LGBTQ+ venue, the Norwegian Lutheran Church offered an apology for hurtful actions and exclusion it had inflicted.

“The national church has brought LGBTQ+ individuals harm, suffering and humiliation,” bishop Olav Fykse Tveit, the church leader, stated on Thursday. “It was wrong for this to take place and which is the reason I offer my apology now.”

“Unequal treatment, harassment and discrimination” led to a loss of faith for some, Tveit recognized. A religious service at Oslo Cathedral was planned to follow his apology.

The statement of regret was delivered at a venue called London Pub, one of two bars involved in the 2022 violent incident that resulted in two deaths and caused serious injuries to nine at Oslo's Pride event. A Norwegian citizen originally from Iran, who had pledged allegiance to Islamic State, was sentenced to a minimum of three decades in prison for the murders.

Like many religions around the world, the Norwegian Lutheran Church – an evangelical Lutheran church that is the most extensive faith community in the country – had long marginalised LGBTQ+ people, preventing them to become pastors or from marrying in religious ceremonies. Back in the 1950s, the church’s bishops characterized LGBTQ+ persons as “a global-scale societal hazard”.

However, as Norway's society grew more liberal, ranking as the second globally to permit registered partnerships for same-sex couples back in 1993 and during 2009 the first Scandinavian country to legalize same-sex marriage, the religious institution eventually adapted.

In 2007, the Norwegian Lutheran Church began ordaining LGBTQ+ clergy, and gay and lesbian couples were permitted to get married in religious ceremonies since 2017. Last year, the bishop took part in the Oslo Pride event 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, Hanne Marie, herself a gay pastor, referred to it as “a crucial act of amends” and a point in time that “finally marked the end of a painful era within the church's past”.

For Stephen Adom, the leader of the Association for Gender and Sexual Diversity in Norway, the statement was “meaningful and vital” but was delivered “not in time for those who passed away from AIDS … carrying heavy hearts because the church considered the crisis as punishment from God”.

Worldwide, several faith-based organizations have tried to offer apologies for their actions towards LGBTQ+ people. In 2023, the Church of England expressed regret for what it characterized as its “shameful” treatment, although it still declines to permit gay marriages within the church.

In a similar vein, 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 held fast in its belief 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 confirmation of the church's “dedication to welcoming all and full inclusion” in every part of the church's activities.

“We have not succeeded to rejoice and take pleasure in the beauty of all creation,” Reverend Blair, the top administrative leader of the church, said. “We have hurt individuals rather than pursuing healing. We are sorry.”