Young people from across Europe gather for an LWF European Youth Gathering in Paris, France, on 30 September - 3 October 2025. Photo: LWF/Albin Hillert
Young Lutherans commit to prayer, dialogue, action for peace
The Lutheran World Federation (LWF) European Youth Gathering 2025 drew to a close with a commitment to “prayer, dialogue, community building, and action for peace.”
Gathered under the theme ‘Promises of Peace’, 30 September – 3 October in Paris, France, 60 young leaders from Lutheran churches across Europe and beyond set out to explore together a wide variety of perspectives on peace – including spiritual, social, ecological, and interpersonal dimensions that inform hope, reconciliation, and justice in today’s complex world.
Core themes guided conversations from personal and individual perspectives, through questions of building peace in community and, ultimately, globally. The group also discussed future projects of the regional networks.
“What's been important for me has been the journey of looking at all the different perspectives of where I find peace, where I find joy, where I find my grounding and my hope for action, thinking about our neighbourhoods and about our communities,” reflected Florian Toth from the Evangelical Church of the Augsburg Confession in Austria.
“If we want to have global peace, we also need to find a way to really build peace in our communities,” he said.
Savanna Sullivan, LWF Program Executive for Youth, underscored that peacebuilding in a global context requires both a shared understanding of the concept of peace, and the development of a sensitivity to what lack of peace can look like.
“Most of us at this event are not from countries where there's active armed warfare ongoing, yet none of us are from totally peaceful societies. So how do we notice what it looks like when there is a lack of peace, whose voices do we listen to when they are trying to tell us in our communities that there is no peace, and then what do we do about it, how do we become peacebuilders in the face of that?” she said.
Intergenerational justice as a dimension of peace
The first of a set of similar regional youth gatherings to span all the seven LWF regions, the meeting in Paris reflected in-depth on a forthcoming Intergenerational Justice Policy of the LWF, based on a mandate grown out of the LWF Thirteenth Assembly in Krakow, Poland in 2023.
If we want to have global peace we also need to find a way to really build peace in our communities
Florian Toth, Austria
As members of the LWF’s Intergenerational Justice Policy task force reported on the strides made so far towards the formulation of such a policy, the young people raised the importance of understanding intergenerational justice as a foundational building block in sustaining peaceful communities.
As Veronica Pålsson, who serves on the taskforce as well as on the LWF Council, observed: “While the call for an intergenerational justice policy came from the youth in Krakow, it really is to be a policy for all generations, to make sure all generations can participate fully in the life of the church.”
Equally, LWF council member Martin Jan Javornik of the Slovak Evangelical Church of Augsburg Confession in Serbia underlined the importance of creating spaces where participation for people from different generations is “not only technically possible and the door is open, but where participation is also truly meaningful.”
Holy Communion is distributed as part of closing worship in Paris, led by Rev. Veronica Pålsson of the Church of Sweden (right). Photo: LWF/Albin Hillert
Charlotte Frank of the Evangelical Church in Central Germany shares information about strides made towards an intergeneration justice policy for the LWF. Photo: LWF/Albin Hillert
Young people from all over Europe and beyond pose for a photo at the LWF European Youth Gathering 2025. Photo: LWF/Albin Hillert
Charlotte Frank of the Evangelical Church in Central Germany, who also serves on the taskforce, underlined how the church will only be able to fully bear witness when all generations are present with equitable opportunities to participate and to contribute.
“As one community, we need to talk to every part of the body and ensure that every part is well and has its needs fulfilled in order to make sure that we as a community, as the LWF but also as the Lutheran churches in every context, really are well,” she reflected, echoing 1 Corinthians 12:26.
“Working on this intergenerational justice policy means in many ways breaking new ground, and it keeps leading to new observations, which makes it really exciting,” Frank concluded.
A message for peace in God’s world
As the event in Paris drew to a close, the young leaders came together in a shared message of peace – based on the foundations of dialogue, hope and action.
Addressing the dimension of Peace for Us, they noted that even as the realization of inner peace becomes increasingly difficult for young people in the face of war, conflict, climate crisis and unequal distribution of wealth. “Our practice of community building this week has strengthened us with hope to continue to seek peace in our own lives and our own communities. This hope is not to be mistaken for naivety, but is grounded in faith, rooted in scripture, and supported by prayer.”
Speaking to the dimensions of Peace in Community, they emphasized that “In the pursuit of peace in our communities, it is essential for us to engage in dialogues on topics that threaten to divide our churches and communities – like the climate emergency, gender injustice and the discrimination of other marginalized groups.”
“Empowered by the promises of God, with the guidance of the Holy Spirit, we commit ourselves to prayer, dialogue, community building, and action for peace,” the young Lutheran leaders concluded.
