sieve-mode as at Emacs 28.1 defines its colors ab initio. This means they have to be themed by hand. I think sieve-mode should inherit from font-lock-*-face, as most other things do. Here is a quick-and-dirty version I knocked out for personal use: (custom-set-faces '(sieve-control-commands ((t :inherit font-lock-builtin-face))) '(sieve-action-commands ((t :inherit font-lock-function-name-face))) '(sieve-test-commands ((t :inherit font-lock-variable-name-face))) '(sieve-tagged-arguments ((t :inherit font-lock-type-face))))