🔗 Share this article

Against deep red curtains at a leading Oslo LGBTQ+ venue, the Church of Norway issued a formal apology for harm and unequal treatment perpetrated over the years.

“Norway's church has brought LGBTQ+ people harm, suffering and humiliation,” bishop Olav Fykse Tveit, Olav Fykse Tveit, announced on Thursday. “This ought not to have occurred and that is why I offer my apology now.”

“Harassment, discrimination and unfair treatment” resulted in some to lose their faith, Tveit recognized. A church service at Oslo Cathedral was arranged to follow his apology.

The statement of regret was delivered at a venue called London Pub, one of two bars attacked during the 2022 violent incident that resulted in two deaths and caused serious injuries to nine throughout the Oslo Pride festivities. A Norwegian citizen originally from Iran, who expressed support for ISIS, was sentenced to a minimum of three decades in incarceration for the murders.

Similar to numerous global faiths, the Norwegian Lutheran Church – a Protestant Lutheran denomination that is the biggest religious group in Norway – historically excluded LGBTQ+ people, refusing to allow them to become pastors or from marrying in religious ceremonies. In the 1950s, bishops of the church characterized LGBTQ+ persons as “a worldwide social threat”.

But as Norwegian society became increasingly liberal, emerging as the world's second to permit registered partnerships for same-sex couples back in 1993 and by 2009 the initial Nordic nation to allow same-sex marriage, the church gradually changed.

Back in 2007, the Church of Norway commenced the ordination of gay pastors, and LGBTQ+ partners could get married in religious ceremonies from 2017 onward. Last year, Tveit joined in Oslo’s Pride parade in what was called an unprecedented step for the church.

The apology on Thursday was met with differing opinions. The leader of an organization for Christian lesbians in Norway, Pedersen-Eriksen, who is also a gay pastor, described it as “an important reparation” and a point in time that “signaled the conclusion of a difficult period in the history of the church”.

According to Stephen Adom, the director of Norway’s Association for Gender and Sexual Diversity, the apology was “meaningful and vital” but arrived “too late for those who passed away from AIDS … with deep sorrow in their hearts because the church considered the crisis as punishment from God”.

Internationally, a handful of religious institutions have attempted to reconcile for their past behavior concerning the LGBTQ+ community. Last year, the Anglican Church apologised for what it described as “disgraceful” conduct, even as it persists in refusing to authorize same-sex weddings within the church.

Likewise, the Methodist Church in Ireland the previous year issued an apology for “shortcomings in pastoral care and support” to LGBTQ+ people and family members, but held fast in its conviction that marriage could only be a bond between male and female.

In the early part of this year, the United Church of Canada offered an apology to two spirit and LGBTQIA+ communities, describing it as a confirmation of its “pledge to complete acceptance and open hospitality” in every part of the church's activities.

“We have failed to honor and appreciate all of your beautiful creation,” Rev Michael Blair, the church's general secretary, said. “We caused pain to people in place of fostering completeness. We apologize.”