Bishop James Conley of Lincoln, Nebraska, is calling for prayers to Mary for peace ahead of Friday’s planned summit between US President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin in Alaska. 

In an Aug. 13 X post, Bishop Conley noted that the summit will take place on the Solemnity of the Assumption and described it as “a hope to move toward a peaceful settlement in Ukraine” more than three years after Russia’s invasion. He urged the faithful to “ask for Mary’s intercession for peace and justice in that region and around the world.”

“Mary, Queen of Peace, we pray you may watch over these talks, comfort the families who have lost loved ones in the fighting, and bring healing to this troubled land,” Bishop Conley wrote, also quoting Pope Leo XIV’s first Sunday blessing in St. Peter’s Square: “Never again war!”

The bishop invited the faithful to join him in prayer in the days leading up to the summit, “asking for Mary’s intercession to bring about a just and lasting peace in Ukraine and all the regions of our world torn apart by war.”

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said Aug. 12 that the president will travel to Anchorage on Friday morning for the meeting with Putin, with the goal of “ending this war and stopping the killing.”

Vice President JD Vance called the upcoming talks a “major breakthrough for American diplomacy.”