🔗 Share this article

Amid red stage curtains at a well-known Oslo location for LGBTQ+ gatherings, the Church of Norway offered an apology for hurtful actions and exclusion caused by the church.

“The church in Norway has caused LGBTQ+ people harm, suffering and humiliation,” the presiding bishop, the church leader, stated on Thursday. “It was wrong for this to take place and that is why today I say sorry.”

“Unequal treatment, harassment and discrimination” resulted in some to lose their faith, Tveit acknowledged. A worship service at the cathedral in Oslo was scheduled to follow his apology.

The apology took place at the London Pub, a bar that was one of two attacked during the 2022 violent incident that killed two people and caused serious injuries to nine throughout the Oslo Pride festivities. An individual of Iranian descent living in Norway, who swore loyalty to Islamic State, was sentenced to at least 30 years in incarceration for the killings.

In common with various worldwide religions, the Norwegian Lutheran Church – a Lutheran evangelical community that is Norway’s largest faith community – had long marginalised LGBTQ+ individuals, denying them the opportunity from serving as pastors or to have church weddings. Back in the 1950s, bishops of the church referred to homosexual individuals as “a worldwide social threat”.

However, as Norway's society grew more liberal, emerging as the world's second to legalize same-sex partnerships in 1993 and during 2009 the initial Nordic nation to allow same-sex marriage, the church slowly followed.

During 2007, the Norwegian Lutheran Church commenced the ordination of gay pastors, and gay and lesbian couples could get married in religious ceremonies since 2017. During 2023, Tveit participated in Oslo’s Pride parade in what was described as an unprecedented step for the church.

The Thursday statement of regret received differing opinions. The head of a network of Christian lesbians in Norway, Hanne Marie, a lesbian minister herself, called it “a crucial act of amends” and an occasion that “signaled the conclusion of a difficult period within the church's past”.

According to Stephen Adom, the director of Norway’s Association for Gender and Sexual Diversity, the apology represented “powerful and significant” but was delivered “too late for those among us who died of Aids … carrying heavy hearts since the church viewed the disease as divine punishment”.

Worldwide, a few churches have attempted to reconcile for their actions regarding LGBTQ+ individuals. During 2023, the Church of England expressed regret for what it referred to as “shameful” actions, even as it persists in refusing to allow same-sex marriages in religious settings.

Likewise, the Methodist Church in Ireland in the past year apologised for its “failures in pastoral support and care” regarding the LGBTQ+ community and their families, but held fast in its conviction that marriage should only represent a partnership of one man and one woman.

In the early part of this year, the United Church based in Canada offered an apology to Two-Spirit and LGBTQIA+ groups, characterizing it as a renewed commitment of the church's “dedication to welcoming all and full inclusion” in all aspects of church life.

“We did not manage to celebrate and delight in the wonderful diversity of creation,” Rev Michael Blair, the church's general secretary, said. “We caused pain to people rather than pursuing healing. We apologize.”