(ENI) — Since the Lutheran-led reformation in 1537, Norway's dominant church — the (Lutheran) Church of Norway — has had the reigning king as its formal head.
In 2002, a Church of Norway commission made a recommendation along the same lines as that of the Lutheran Church of Sweden which has loosened its state ties.
"The debate on state-church relations may prove to be the most demanding and extensive one [in the coming years]," Trond Giske, the Norwegian minister for culture and church affairs, told the Church of Norway general synod in Lillehammer in November.
Representing Norway's new left-centre government, Giske told the 85-member general synod that the church-state report would take all views into account.
The Church of Norway counts around 88 per cent of the country's 4.5 million inhabitants as members.
