The Norwegian Church Delivers Apology to LGBTQ+ People for ‘Shame, Great Harm and Pain’
Set against crimson theater drapes at a well-known Oslo location for LGBTQ+ gatherings, the Norwegian Lutheran Church offered an apology for hurtful actions and exclusion caused by the church.
“Norway's church has brought LGBTQ+ people harm, suffering and humiliation,” the presiding bishop, Olav Fykse Tveit, stated during a Thursday event. “This should never have happened and that is why I apologise today.”
The “discrimination, unequal treatment and harassment” had caused some to lose their faith, Tveit acknowledged. A religious service at the cathedral in Oslo was scheduled to come after the apology.
The apology was delivered at the London Pub, one among two bars attacked during the 2022 attack that took two lives and caused serious injuries to nine at Oslo's Pride event. A Norwegian citizen originally from Iran, who expressed support for ISIS, received a sentence to a minimum of three decades in prison for the murders.
Similar to numerous global faiths, the Norwegian Lutheran Church – an evangelical Lutheran church that is Norway’s largest faith community – historically excluded LGBTQ+ individuals, refusing to allow them from joining the clergy or to marry in church. In the 1950s, church leaders referred to homosexual individuals as a “social danger of global proportions”.
Yet, with Norwegian society turning more progressive, emerging as the world's second to permit registered partnerships for same-sex couples during 1993 and in 2009 the first Scandinavian country to approve gay marriage, the religious institution eventually adapted.
In 2007, the Church of Norway began ordaining gay pastors, and gay and lesbian couples were permitted to get married in religious ceremonies from 2017 onward. Last year, Tveit participated in the Pride march in Oslo in what was described as a historic moment for the religious institution.
Thursday’s apology elicited varied responses. The leader of an organization of Christian lesbians in Norway, Hanne Marie, who is also a gay pastor, described it as “a significant step toward healing” and an occasion that “represented the closure of a difficult period in the history of the church”.
For Stephen Adom, the director of Norway’s Association for Gender and Sexual Diversity, the apology was “powerful and significant” but was delivered “overdue for individuals who lost their lives to AIDS … carrying heavy hearts as the church regarded the disease as punishment from God”.
Worldwide, a few churches have sought to reconcile for their actions regarding LGBTQ+ individuals. Last year, the Anglican Church expressed regret for what it characterized as “shameful” actions, although it still declines to permit gay marriages in church.
Similarly, the Methodist Church located in Ireland last year expressed regret for its “failures in pastoral support and care” toward LGBTQ+ individuals and their relatives, but held fast in its conviction that matrimony must only constitute a union between a man and a woman.
Several months ago, Canada's United Church delivered a statement of regret to Two-Spirit and LGBTQIA+ groups, labeling it a renewed commitment of the church's “dedication to welcoming all and full inclusion” in every part of the church's activities.
“We have not succeeded to honor and appreciate all of your beautiful creation,” Reverend Blair, the general secretary of the church, said. “We have wounded people instead of seeking wholeness. We express our regret.”