In case this helps someone else... If I remove jboss-app.xml from app.ear/META-INF/ then the messages.properties file in each WAR is loaded for the appropriate context. With jboss-app.xml included, only one of the messages.properties files is loaded, the others are ignored. I'm not certain whether it is better to include jboss-app.xml or not on an app server with only a single seam application. View the original post : http://www.jboss.com/index.html?module=bb&op=viewtopic&p=4125217#... Reply to the post : http://www.jboss.com/index.html?module=bb&op=posting&mode=reply&a...