POPE LEO XIV AND A.I.   

HAVE YOU READ POPE LEO’S MAGNIFICA HUMANITAS? Or, instead of this exercise in Latin, its English Magnificent Humanity, all 42,300 words of it? No? Me neither. 

Some might be tempted to have an obsequious A.I. do a brief summary of it—but that misses the point entirely. And it is an important and timely encyclical. 

In lieu of this, here are tidbits I gleaned from sources as varied as America The Jesuit Review: “Pope Leo Gives Stark Warning on A.I.: We Must ‘Safeguard Ourselves,’ ” by Paulina Guzik, January 26, 2026; The New York Times: “Main Takeaways From Pope Leo’s Encyclical on A.I.,” by Ruth Graham and Elizabeth Dias, May 25, 2026; Vatican News: “Pope Leo’s ‘Magnifica Humanitas’: A.I. Must Serve Humanity Not Concentrate Power,” by Isabella Piro, May 25, 2026; The New York Times: “To Understand Pope Leo’s Efforts on A.I., Look at the Man Shaking His Hand,” by Elizabeth Dias, May 26, 2026; and The Hollywood Reporter: “Vatican Expert on A.I.: “I Wouldn’t Have Matthew McConaughey and the Pope on the Same Bingo Card,” by Steven Zeitchik, May 27, 2026.

Quite the collection of canonical and non-canonical sources, you’ll admit. You’re encouraged to read them all, as I did during the gleaning. 

Long Ago, the Industrial Revolution; Now, A.I. Paulina Guznik recounts in her America The Jesuit Review article: “Pope Leo XIV didn’t just write his first message as Pontiff for World Communications Day Jan. 24. He wrote a programmatic document on artificial intelligence in response to the challenges of the modern world, just like Pope Leo XIII faced the industrial revolution more than a century before…. A.I. and digital technologies are reshaping human communication, creativity and identity. And the greatest risks, the pope said, are not technical but deeply human.”

Pope Leo XIV speaks during the presentation of “Magnifica Humanitas,” his first encyclical, at the Vatican. This and the following image by Yara Nardi/Reuters from The New York Times. 

The Danger of Algorithms. Guznik observes, “Algorithms, the pope warned, ‘reward quick emotions and instead penalize human expressions that require more time, such as the effort to understand and reflect.’ They close people into ‘bubbles of easy consensus and easy indignation’ and ‘weaken the capacity for listening and critical thinking and increase social polarization.’ ”

She continues sharing the pontiff’s views: “The challenge ahead of humanity ‘is not to stop digital innovation, but to guide it,’ the pope said, ‘to be aware of its ambivalent nature. It is up to each of us to raise our voices in defense of the human person, so that these tools may truly be integrated by us as allies.’ ”

Pope Leo XIV shakes the hand of Christopher Olah, a co-founder of the A.I. company Anthropic, on Monday at the Vatican.

A Possible Alliance. Guznik notes, “This alliance is possible, the pontiff said, urging that it be founded on three pillars:  ‘responsibility, cooperation, and education.’ With this, Pope Leo challenged A.I. moguls and Silicon Valley: ‘For those at the top of online platforms, this means ensuring that their business strategies are not driven solely by the criterion of profit maximization, but also by a far-sighted vision that takes the common good into account, in the same way that each of them cares about the good of their own children.’”

Let us ignore for the moment that not all of these A.I. moguls are particularly renowned for their parental attributes. 

Serving Humanity, Not Concentrating Power. Isabella Piro observes in her Vatican News article that among issues the pontiff addresses is the disarming of A.I.: “To disarm does not mean rejecting technology, but preventing it from dominating humanity.”

Avoiding a New Colonialism. Piro also recounts, “… the Pope upholds the importance of combating new forms of slavery as another ‘decisive test for ethical discernment’ in the digital transformation…. At the same time, the Pope ‘sincerely asks forgiveness’ for the delay with which the Church in the past condemned ‘the scourge of slavery.’ ”

Protecting Identities. Piro continues, “The encyclical also refers to the vital information—for example, on health and demographics—used to guide economic strategies. He calls this a new face of colonialism that turns personal lives into exploitable information, making the digital environment a ‘space of exploitation.’ ”

Other Takeaways. Ruth Graham and Elizabeth Dias summarize the pontiff’s observations in their article in The New York Times: A.I. is fundamentally not human. Human labor practices and just wages remain essential. No technology can take away the dignity of ordinary human beings. Beware the temptation of erecting a new Tower of Babel. Human life is beautiful. 

Graham and Dias describe, “The biblical story of the Tower of Babel recurs as a touchstone. The account appears in the Book of Genesis, and describes a world in which a unified human population that speaks only one language decides to build a tower ‘whose top reaches to the heavens’ in order to exert its own power and domination.” 

They quote from the pontiff’s encyclical: “With the heart of a shepherd and a father, I ask everyone to abandon the construction of yet another Tower of Babel and to join forces in building up the common good, so that humanity will never lose its beauty, and the world once again will come to recognize the human heart as the place where God desires to dwell.”

Furthermore, the pontiff writes, “…. humanity—in all its grandeur and woundedness—must never be replaced or surpassed. We can embrace the technological progress that alleviates suffering and unlocks new possibilities, provided that we do not abandon the very essence of our humanity, namely the capacity for relationship and love.” 

And Recall: Leo XIV is an American. Not only is the pontiff a Chicago White Sox fan, he is knowledgable of California’s entertainment industry and of its Silicon Valley. Steven Zeitchik observes in his Hollywood Reporter article, “Until now, Hollywood figures have been some of the most vocal A.I. watchdogs. Now a whole new personality has entered the mix, one who has standing with 1.4 billion people around the world, giving those in the creative community pushing for caution and regulations a new tool in their fight.” ds

© Dennis Simanaitis, SimanaitisSays.com, 2026