Just Peace Sunday 2025
The Thirtieth General Synod called on the congregations of the United Church of Christ to mark the Sunday preceding September 21 (which the United Nation recognizes as the “International Day of Prayer for Peace”) as Just Peace Sunday.
In 2025, Just Peace Sunday is Sept. 14
“The Earth Mourns”
In 2025, Just Peace Sunday takes place at a time of unprecedented upheaval. Our immigrant and other community neighbors are being denied civil rights, in Gaza, Ukraine, and Sudan the soil itself is soaked with blood. Policies that protect our planet are being rolled back or cut to the detriment of the Earth itself and our collective future. In our prophetic imagination, we can almost hear the Earth groaning in lament, along with our Creator God, amidst the chaos.
In 2025, we lift up the theme “The Earth Shall Mourn” based on the lectionary passage in the book of Jeremiah, chapter 4 verses 23-28. Jeremiah warns of a world in chaos not unlike what we are seeing today resulting from climate-induced natural disasters, environmental degradation, and corporate exploitation. Jeremiah writes:
“I looked on the earth, and it was complete chaos, and to the heavens, and they had no light. I looked on the mountains, and they were quaking, and all the hills moved to and fro. I looked, and there was no one at all, and all the birds of the air had fled. I looked, and the fruitful land was a desert, and all its cities were laid in ruins before the Lord, before his fierce anger. For thus says the Lord: The whole land shall be a desolation, yet I will not make a full end. Because of this the earth shall mourn and the heavens above grow black, for I have spoken; I have purposed; I have not relented, nor will I turn back.” Jeremiah 4:23-28
Since January 20th, policy changes have only exacerbated the strain on the Earth and escalated climate change. The U.S. is no longer part of the Paris Climate Agreement and “climate change” has been scrubbed from federal websites. Fossil fuel investments have been expedited and drilling/mining projects, including in Alaska approved. Critical EPA and FEMA staff have been fired and grant funding frozen. The Administration created an energy “dominance” council and rolled back EPA consideration of environmental justice in projects. And in the “Big Beautiful Bill”, wind & solar tax credits have been cut along with IRA clean energy investments. The list could go on!
The Earth Shall Mourn, and we as people of faith and advocates are called to join this lament and recommit to a different future. Only through repentance in the face of our complicity in environmental degradation can we as a global population ever be catalyzed into action.
Join us as we follow the voices of environmental justice leaders, indigenous peoples, and our youth who are leading us toward a more just and peaceful connection with the Earth. As Jeremiah reminds us, God has promised “…yet I will not make a full end.” There is hope! Peace with the Earth is possible, and it is part of our call and mandate as people of faith.
-Rev. Michael Neuroth, Director of the Washington D.C. Office
Together, let us mark Just Peace Sunday in 2025 – and also support several other environmental justice efforts throughout the month of September!
🌍 Season of Creation – September 1- October 4th with the theme “Peace with Creation” https://seasonofcreation.org/
🌍 Creation Justice Ministries’ – “Witness for Creation Justice” in September with events in DC, AZ, & MI –https://www.creationjustice.org/
🌍 Sun Day – “Rise Up for a Sun-Powered Planet” on September 21st – https://sunday.earth
Worship Resources
Sermon Seeds: The Earth Mourns – Download this “Sermon Seeds” for Just Peace Sunday inspired by Jeremiah 4:11-28 written by Rev. Dr. Sheila Harvey, pastor of Union Congregational United Church of Christ in West Palm Beach, FL.
‘Preaching for God’s World’ Written by, Rev Chesnay, this is actively engage in the intersection between faith and social transformation, drawing upon the principles and insights of Black theology to inform my practice and advocacy.
Creation-Inclusive Liturgy For Holy Communion in an Ecumenical Setting Offered for devotional use and local adaptation. Writer: Rev DJM Coleman, EcoChaplain, EcoCongregation Scotland.
The Power of God: From Extractive Theology to Transformative Faith The Power of God: From Extractive Theology to Transformative Faith emerges at a critical moment in the story of creation and church. As Christians living through cascading ecological crises, this is a moment we might rediscover and reimagine how God’s power moves through all of creation — from the mighty cedars to the smallest fungi, from raging floods to gentle rains, from electrons moving through our power lines to the quiet energy that flows through every living cell.
Prayer Book from the Laudato Si’ Movement The Laudato Si’ Movement Prayer Book features moving prayers from around the globe and will help you and your loved ones experience the ecological conversion.
Art for Just Peace Sunday
Craft Activity for Youth & Children: Peace Doves
Observe UCC Just Peace Sunday, church-wide, by giving your children a biblical look at Just Peace and making a craft with your church youth and children. These peace doves can be draped throughout your building in celebration of Just Peace Sunday and in observance of the International Peace Day (September 21). It will be a vivid witness to your congregation’s commitment to peace.
Peace Dove Craft
Children from all over the world fold paper cranes each year as symbols of hope and peace. These cranes are in memory of the story of Sadako Sasaki who died of radiation induced leukemia in 1955, but not after inspiring the world through her folded cranes. Read Sadako’s story here. In folding, we echo Sadako’s hope for the world: This is our cry, This is our prayer, Peace in the world.
This year, we will be folding Peace Doves which are as symbols of hope, peace, transformation, endurance, and life. These doves will also highlight our new Just Peace logo that includes a purple dove. See if you can find purple orgami paper at a craft story near you or online, and refer to these instruction for how to fold.
🕊️ Download the Peace Doves activity
🕊️ While your children are crafting consider inviting them to sing along with music about peacemaking.
🕊️ Consider sending pictures, or the actual doves, to your state and national leaders as an act of advocacy. And please send us the pictures so that we can share them with UCC congregations across the country! Post them on Twitter and tag @JustPeaceUCC or email neurothm@ucc.org.
The Peace Dove Craft was created by Tirsana Paudel, a graduate of Bryn Mawr College. Tirsana is committed to peacemaking and uses her artistic gifts to raise awareness about the need for peace with justice.
Take Action
Get Involved in Creation Justice Ministry!
Check out this page written by Rev. Brooks Berndt on how to be engaged in Creation Justice Ministry that lifts up 10 ways to climb the ladder of engagement.
Support Environmental Justice for All
For over 40 years, the United Church of Christ has supported the environmental justice movement and was and continues to be on the front lines of the environmental justice movement.
As Christians, we are called to be good stewards of the earth and care for the planet and its inhabitants by God (Genesis 1:24-28).
Join us in urging Congress and the President to re-open the EPA’s Office of Environmental Justice and External Civil Rights today!
Advocate for Just Peace with the Earth
At General Synod 32, the United Church of Christ became the first U.S. Christian body to endorse the Green New Deal, a congressional resolution seeking to address the climate crisis. This endorsement affirms our belief as people of faith and conscience; we are called to care for this world that is the Lord’s.
“The earth is the Lord’s, and everything in it, the world, and all who live in it; for God founded it upon the seas and established it upon the waters.” Psalm 24:1-2
Last year, the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reported that an increase of 1.5 degrees Celsius over the next 12 years could have irreversible catastrophic effects on our world. Now more than ever before, we have a moral duty to uphold our call to care for creation.
Our faith calls us to be prophetic voices, responding to injustice with a vision of how our world can be more loving, healthy and equitable. As we celebrate Just Peace Sunday, call on Congress to address the urgency of the climate crisis by passing legislation that follows the following principles:
• Truth and science: Solutions that are in line with scientific consensus on global warming and that respond with the needed urgency and thoroughness.
• Restoration and renewal: Economic and environmental revitalization that includes job programs, skills training, education, investment in a clean energy economy and just transition for both urban and rural areas.
• Compassion and fairness: Just treatment for all including workers and communities most dependent on fossil fuel energy.
• Interdependence across boundaries: Sacred dialogue across political, geographic, racial and cultural boundaries.
People’s Prayers for Peace
The UCC has issued an open invitation for people to offer a prayer to end violence in any manifestation, and to bring about peace. Share your prayers using the People’s Prayers for Peace form
Study Resources
In October 2017, the World Council of Churches held a conference in Iceland under the theme “Just Peace with the Earth”. This conference called on the church to advance environmental sustainability. In the final message of gathering, participants reflected on the vision of human flourishing depicted in St. John’s book of Revelation (22:2). This image can offer hope to us today, even amidst the climate and other emergencies we face. As people of the cross, we believe that God has not forsaken us but is instead calling us to turn from our destructive ways and join in the act of creating all things new.
“On each side of the river stood the tree of life, bearing twelve crops of fruit, yielding its fruit every month. And the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations.” Revelation 22:2
WHAT IS THIS CRISIS?
🌍 We Have 12 Years to limit climate change catastrophe, warns UN
🌍 True Climate Justice is Impossible without Racial and Economic Justice
🌍 Arctic Ice is Crashing, and That’s Bad News for Everyone
🌍 One Million Species at Risk of Extinction, UN report warns
FAITHFUL RESPONSES
🌍 Pray and protect: faith saves forests of Cambodia
🌍 The Green New Deal Picks up Major Christian Endorsements
🌍 Pope Francis declares ‘climate emergency’ and urges action
🌍 Overwhelmed by climate change? Here’s what you can do (Including becoming involved in UCC Environmental Justice Ministries!)
General Resources
Download the Just Peace Handbook
In 2015, the 30th General Synod held in Cleveland, OH marked the UCC’s 30th anniversary as a Just Peace Church and called for a renewal of the UCC’s Just Peace witness. This booklet is intended to accompany this resolution and be a resource for all levels and areas of the church for further work and witness, especially to local congregations declaring or recommitting themselves as “Just Peace Churches.” This resource includes a summary of the historical and theological uniqueness of the Just Peace vision; the biblical and theological grounding for Just Peace values; and recommended steps for how to become a Just Peace Church. (Download.)
Find additional resources here.
What is Just Peace?
Just Peace is not a destination, but a path requiring awareness and constant vigilance to resolve existing and developing conflict in ourselves, our families, our communities, our institutions, and our world. This path requires non-violence when possible and even when impossible to engage in love and restraint. Just Peace envisions a renewed, vibrant, diverse, and sustainable world free of violence.
Just Peace is grounded in God’s activity in creation; God’s covenant patience and provision in the wilderness; in the reconciling activity of Jesus Christ; in the presence of the Holy Spirit; and in the community of reconciliation. Shalom is the vision that pulls all creation toward a time when weapons are made into ploughs and all creatures lie down together without fear; where all have their own vine, fig tree, and dwell secure from want. As Christians, we offer this conviction to the world: Peace is possible!