🔗 Share this article

Set against crimson theater drapes at a leading Oslo LGBTQ+ venue, Norway's national church offered an apology for harm and unequal treatment perpetrated over the years.

“The church in Norway has brought LGBTQ+ individuals harm, suffering and humiliation,” the presiding bishop, Bishop Tveit, declared on Thursday. “It was wrong for this to take place and this is why today I say sorry.”

“Harassment, discrimination and unfair treatment” led to a loss of faith for some, Tveit acknowledged. A worship service at Oslo's main cathedral was scheduled to come after the apology.

This formal apology occurred at the London Pub establishment, one among two bars targeted in the 2022 attack that resulted in two deaths and injured nine people severely throughout the Oslo Pride festivities. A Norwegian of Iranian origin, who swore loyalty to Islamic State, was sentenced to a minimum of three decades in incarceration for carrying out the attacks.

In common with various worldwide religions, the Church of Norway – an evangelical Lutheran church that is the biggest religious group in Norway – historically excluded LGBTQ+ individuals, preventing them from joining the clergy or from marrying in religious ceremonies. In the 1950s, bishops of the church described gay people as “a worldwide social threat”.

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

In 2007, the Church of Norway started appointing LGBTQ+ clergy, and LGBTQ+ partners have been able to have church weddings starting in 2017. Last year, Tveit participated in Oslo’s Pride parade in what was described as a first for the church.

Thursday’s apology elicited a mixed reaction. The director of a group for Christian lesbians in Norway, Hanne Marie, a lesbian minister herself, called it “a crucial act of amends” and a point in time that “represented the closure of a painful era in the history of the church”.

According to Stephen Adom, the director of Norway’s Association for Gender and Sexual Diversity, the apology was “powerful and significant” but arrived “overdue for individuals among us who died of Aids … carrying heavy hearts as the church regarded the epidemic as divine punishment”.

Worldwide, a handful of religious institutions have sought to reconcile for their actions concerning the LGBTQ+ community. In 2023, England's church said sorry for what it described as its “shameful” treatment, although it continues to refuse to allow same-sex marriages in church.

Likewise, Ireland's Methodist Church the previous year expressed regret for “shortcomings in pastoral care and support” regarding the LGBTQ+ community and their families, but stayed firm in its conviction that marriage could only be a union between a man and a woman.

In the early part of this year, the United Church based in Canada issued 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 rejoice and take pleasure in the beauty of all creation,” Rev Michael Blair, the general secretary of the church, said. “We have wounded people in place of fostering completeness. We are sorry.”