diff --git a/CHANGELOG.md b/CHANGELOG.md
index 28834b1b..6b737c61 100644
--- a/CHANGELOG.md
+++ b/CHANGELOG.md
@@ -23,6 +23,7 @@ The **patch** part changes incrementally at each release.
 
 ### Fixed
 
+* certbot: an empty change shouldn't raise an exception
 * certbot: fix "no-self-upgrade" option
 
 ### Removed
diff --git a/certbot/files/hooks/z-commit-etc.sh b/certbot/files/hooks/z-commit-etc.sh
index e543b4ad..c83a4039 100644
--- a/certbot/files/hooks/z-commit-etc.sh
+++ b/certbot/files/hooks/z-commit-etc.sh
@@ -22,7 +22,7 @@ main() {
           message="[letsencrypt] certificates renewal (${RENEWED_DOMAINS})"
           ${git_bin} commit --message "${message}" --quiet
       else
-          error "Weird, nothing has changed but the hook has been executed for '${RENEWED_DOMAINS}'"
+          debug "Weird, nothing has changed but the hook has been executed for '${RENEWED_DOMAINS}'"
       fi
     fi
 }