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Set against red stage curtains at one of Oslo’s most prominent LGBTQ+ spaces, Norway's national church expressed regret for harm and unequal treatment perpetrated over the years.

“The national church has caused the LGBTQ+ community shame, great harm and pain,” the lead bishop, the church leader, declared on Thursday. “This ought not to have occurred and which is the reason today I say sorry.”

The “discrimination, unequal treatment and harassment” led to a loss of faith for some, Tveit recognized. A church service at Oslo Cathedral was arranged to follow his apology.

The statement of regret occurred at a venue called London Pub, one of two bars involved in the 2022 violent incident that resulted in two deaths and left nine seriously injured during Oslo’s Pride celebrations. An individual of Iranian descent living in Norway, who expressed support for ISIS, was given a prison term to a minimum of three decades behind bars for carrying out the attacks.

In common with various worldwide religions, the Church of Norway – a Protestant Lutheran denomination that is the most extensive faith community in the country – had long marginalised LGBTQ+ people, preventing them from serving as pastors or to have church weddings. Back in the 1950s, the church’s bishops characterized LGBTQ+ persons as “a worldwide social threat”.

Yet, with Norwegian society turning more progressive, emerging as the world's second to legalize same-sex partnerships in 1993 and during 2009 the first in Scandinavia to approve gay marriage, the church gradually changed.

In 2007, Norway's church started appointing gay pastors, and same-sex couples were permitted to marry in church from 2017 onward. In 2023, the bishop took part in Oslo’s Pride parade in what was called an unprecedented step for the church.

The apology on Thursday elicited differing opinions. The head of a network for Christian lesbians in Norway, Hanne Marie, a lesbian minister herself, called it “a crucial act of amends” and an occasion that “represented the closure of a painful era in the history of the church”.

For Stephen Adom, the leader of the Association for Gender and Sexual Diversity in Norway, the statement was “powerful and significant” but was delivered “overdue for individuals who lost their lives to AIDS … carrying heavy hearts as the church regarded the disease as divine punishment”.

Globally, a handful of religious institutions have tried to offer apologies for historical treatment regarding LGBTQ+ individuals. During 2023, the Anglican Church expressed regret for what it referred to as “disgraceful” conduct, although it still declines to allow same-sex marriages within the church.

In a similar vein, Ireland's Methodist Church the previous year apologised for “shortcomings in pastoral care and support” regarding the LGBTQ+ community and family members, but stayed firm in the view that matrimony must only constitute a partnership of one man and one woman.

Earlier this year, the United Church based in Canada offered an apology toward Two-Spirit and LGBTQIA+ individuals, describing it as a renewed commitment of the church's “dedication to welcoming all and full inclusion” throughout every area of church life.

“We did not manage to honor and appreciate the wonderful diversity of creation,” Rev Michael Blair, the general secretary of the church, said. “We caused pain to people in place of fostering completeness. We express our regret.”