Church of Norway Delivers Sincere Apology to LGBTQ+ Community for ‘Harm, Shame and Suffering’

Amid crimson theater drapes at a well-known Oslo location for LGBTQ+ gatherings, the Norwegian Lutheran Church offered an apology for discrimination and harm perpetrated over the years.

“Norway's church has brought LGBTQ+ individuals harm, suffering and humiliation,” the lead bishop, the church leader, declared on Thursday. “This should never have happened and which is the reason I offer my apology now.”

The “discrimination, unequal treatment and harassment” resulted in a loss of faith for some, the bishop admitted. A worship service at Oslo's main cathedral was arranged to take place after his statement.

The apology occurred at the London Pub, a bar that was one of two involved in the 2022 shooting that took two lives and caused serious injuries to nine throughout the Oslo Pride festivities. A Norwegian citizen originally from Iran, who had pledged allegiance to Islamic State, was given a prison term to at least 30 years in prison for carrying out the attacks.

In common with various worldwide religions, the Norwegian Lutheran Church – a Protestant Lutheran denomination that is the biggest religious group in Norway – for years sidelined the LGBTQ+ community, preventing them from joining the clergy or to have church weddings. In the 1950s, the church’s bishops characterized LGBTQ+ persons as “a worldwide social threat”.

Yet, with Norwegian society turning more progressive, becoming the second in the world to allow same-sex registered partnerships back in 1993 and in 2009 the initial Nordic nation to approve gay marriage, the church gradually changed.

During 2007, the Church of Norway commenced the ordination of homosexual ministers, and gay and lesbian couples could marry in church since 2017. During 2023, Tveit joined in the Pride march in Oslo in what was described as an unprecedented step for the church.

Thursday’s apology elicited a mixed reaction. The director of a group of Christian lesbians in Norway, Hanne Marie, herself a gay pastor, referred to it as “a significant step toward healing” and a point in time that “signaled the conclusion of a difficult period in the church’s history”.

For Stephen Adom, the director of Norway’s Association for Gender and Sexual Diversity, the apology was “meaningful and vital” but was delivered “overdue for individuals among us who died of Aids … with hearts filled with anguish as the church regarded the disease to be God’s punishment”.

Internationally, several faith-based organizations have attempted to offer apologies for historical treatment regarding LGBTQ+ individuals. During 2023, England's church expressed regret for what it described as its “shameful” treatment, even as it still declines to permit gay marriages in church.

Likewise, the Methodist Church located in Ireland the previous year apologised for its “failures in pastoral support and care” to LGBTQ+ people and their families, but stayed firm in its belief that marriage could only be a union between a man and a woman.

Earlier this year, Canada's United Church delivered a statement of regret to Two-Spirit and LGBTQIA+ groups, characterizing it as a renewed commitment of the church’s “commitment to radical hospitality and full inclusion” in all aspects of church life.

“We did not manage to rejoice and take pleasure in all of your beautiful creation,” Rev Michael Blair, the general secretary of the church, remarked. “We caused pain to people rather than pursuing healing. We express our regret.”