Norway's Church Issues Apology to LGBTQ+ People for ‘Harm, Shame and Suffering’
Against red stage curtains at one of Oslo’s most prominent LGBTQ+ spaces, the Norwegian Lutheran Church issued a formal apology for harm and unequal treatment it had inflicted.
“The church in Norway has caused LGBTQ+ individuals harm, suffering and humiliation,” the presiding bishop, Bishop Tveit, announced during a Thursday event. “It was wrong for this to take place and that is why I offer my apology now.”
The “discrimination, unequal treatment and harassment” led to certain individuals abandoning their faith, Tveit acknowledged. A religious service at Oslo's main cathedral was arranged to come after the apology.
The statement of regret occurred at the London Pub, one of two bars attacked during the 2022 shooting that took two lives and injured nine people severely throughout the Oslo Pride festivities. An individual of Iranian descent living in Norway, who swore loyalty to Islamic State, was given a prison term to no less than 30 years in incarceration for the murders.
Like many religions around the world, the Church of Norway – an evangelical Lutheran church that is Norway’s largest faith community – had long marginalised the LGBTQ+ community, refusing to allow them from joining the clergy or to marry in church. 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 allow same-sex registered partnerships in 1993 and in 2009 the first Scandinavian country to allow same-sex marriage, the church slowly followed.
In 2007, the Church of Norway started appointing gay pastors, and LGBTQ+ partners could have church weddings since 2017. In 2023, Tveit joined in the Oslo Pride event in what was noted as a historic moment for the religious institution.
The apology on Thursday was met with varied responses. The leader of an organization representing Norwegian Christian lesbians, Hanne Marie Pedersen-Eriksen, who is also a gay pastor, referred to it as “an important reparation” and an occasion that “finally marked the end of a difficult period in the church’s history”.
According to Stephen Adom, the director of the Norwegian Association for Gender and Sexual Diversity, the apology was “meaningful and vital” but arrived “not in time for those who lost their lives to AIDS … with deep sorrow in their hearts because the church considered the epidemic to be God’s punishment”.
Internationally, a handful of religious institutions have tried to make amends for their past behavior concerning the LGBTQ+ community. In 2023, England's church expressed regret for what it characterized as its “shameful” treatment, even as it persists in refusing to allow same-sex marriages within the church.
Similarly, Ireland's Methodist Church in the past year expressed regret for “inadequate pastoral assistance and care” regarding the LGBTQ+ community and their families, but remained staunch in the view that marriage should only represent a bond between male and female.
Several months ago, the United Church based in Canada offered an apology toward Two-Spirit and LGBTQIA+ individuals, labeling it a reaffirmation of its “pledge to complete acceptance and open hospitality” in all aspects of church life.
“We did not manage to honor and appreciate the beauty of all creation,” Michael Blair, the church's general secretary, remarked. “We caused pain to people instead of seeking wholeness. We are sorry.”
