Extract from Eureka Street
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- Vol 36 No 10
- Pope says AI must serve humanity, not power
- Claudio Betti
- 28 May 2026
It is clear that Pope Leo's document requires deeper analysis and cannot be exhausted by a rapid reading, yet some elements stand out immediately.
Not an era of change, but a change of era. Pope Francis' expression runs throughout the entire encyclical Magnifica Humanitas by Leo XIV. The impression is that the Pope reads our time as a historical phase marked by the meeting of two major phenomena. On one side, the extraordinary growth of technological capabilities and the possibilities offered by artificial intelligence. On the other side, the emergence of a culture where the language of force, control, and competition gradually replaces cooperation, fraternity, and shared responsibility. More than a document dedicated to artificial intelligence, the encyclical is a reflection on the human person and the destiny of contemporary society. AI becomes the visible starting point, almost the concrete place where deeper questions become evident. The real question running through the text concerns the human being: how people understand themselves, work, power, freedom, truth, and relationships.
Cardinal Fernández also observed this during the presentation of the document, insisting on the subtitle of the encyclical, which identifies its core concern as safeguarding the human person. In short, this should not be read as an encyclical about artificial intelligence, but as an encyclical in the time of artificial intelligence. The distinction is fundamental. An encyclical on artificial intelligence would probably have focused on technical characteristics, systems, regulations, and the limitations of digital tools. Leo XIV chooses a different path. Artificial intelligence represents the historical context within which deeper questions emerge. The real issues concern the human person, dignity, work, freedom, truth, power, and the future of human coexistence.
The first impression is that we are facing a new Rerum Novarum. At the end of the nineteenth century, Leo XIII confronted a revolution changing the world. Factories, machines, capital, and industrial transformations reshaped work and social life. On one side, immense wealth was produced. On the other side, new forms of poverty and exploitation emerged. Leo XIII understood that the problem was not the machine. The problem was humanity within the new system.
Leo XIV also adds an important observation regarding the birth of Rerum Novarum itself. He recalls that the encyclical did not arise simply from theoretical reflection or abstract principles. It was born from listening. Leo XIII looked at a changing world. He observed new factories, new forms of poverty, injustices, and suffering emerging at the heart of the industrial revolution. Before speaking, he listened. Before offering principles, he sought to understand.
Magnifica Humanitas arises from the same attitude. The encyclical is born from listening to the signs of the times, according to the language of the Second Vatican Council. It is also born from listening to real people, their fears, hopes, wounds, and expectations. This recalls the opening of Gaudium et Spes, when the Council states that “the joys and hopes, the griefs and anxieties of the people of this age, especially of those who are poor or in any way afflicted, are the joys and hopes, the griefs and anxieties of the followers of Christ.”
This point deserves attention because it prevents an overly abstract reading of the document. Artificial intelligence is not observed from above as an isolated technical phenomenon. It is considered from the perspective of the men and women who will experience its consequences. It focuses on those who risk losing employment, those who could be excluded from decision-making processes, and those who could become invisible within increasingly automated systems.
“At Babel, human beings seek a single language. They seek uniformity, control, and power. At Pentecost, something different happens. A new language is not born. A language made new is born. Each person continues to hear in their own language and history. The Spirit does not eliminate differences. It makes them understandable. Unity does not arise from uniformity but from communion.”
As often happens in Catholic Social Teaching, the encyclical's gaze begins with those on the margins. With people who risk having no voice. With those who often remain at the edges of major historical transformations. Listening to the signs of the times becomes inseparable from listening to the sufferings and expectations of the men and women of our age.
Today the risk appears different, yet surprisingly similar. If in the past human beings risked becoming components within the industrial machine, today they may become data, algorithms, digital profiles, statistics, or measurable performances. It is not difficult to recognise signs of this transformation. Technological capacities continue to grow, possibilities of control increase, and enormous wealth concentrates in the hands of very few economic and technological actors. Some enter the future at extraordinary speed while others risk being left behind.
The encyclical therefore asks a simple and radical question. Who truly benefits from progress? Who remains outside? Who becomes invisible?
The document places itself within the broader tradition of the Church's social teaching. Recalling Paul VI, it brings back a significant expression: the Church is “an expert in humanity”. This phrase does not mean the Church possesses technical expertise superior to scientists, economists, or engineers. It means something different. Through centuries of history, wars, crises, and transformations, the Church has learned to continually ask what makes the human person truly human. Its fundamental questions do not concern the functioning of machines but the destiny of persons.
For this reason, one of the most interesting aspects of the encyclical is that the Church does not seek a new enemy. It did not do so during the Industrial Revolution and does not do so today with artificial intelligence. Magnifica Humanitas does not construct a conflict between faith and technology. Anna Rowlands recalled this during the presentation. The Church has often seen technological innovations as opportunities for growth and encounter. Printing enabled an unimaginable spread of knowledge. New forms of communication transformed how the Gospel was proclaimed. The internet has opened new possibilities for knowledge and relationships.
The question is not whether technology should be accepted or rejected. The question concerns how it is inserted within a vision of the human person and society.
Here one of the most beautiful biblical images of the entire document emerges. On one side stands Babel. On the other side stands the rebuilding of Jerusalem in the time of Nehemiah. Babel represents a project of domination and self-sufficiency. Human beings seek to ascend to heaven through their own strength. They seek greatness and uniformity. The logic of Babel is also the logic of force that attempts to build the world from above, imposing a single language, a single direction, and a single criterion of judgment. Jerusalem instead represents a city built upon communion. If Babel is born from the desire to reach God through human power, Jerusalem is born from the encounter between God and humanity. If Babel creates uniformity, Jerusalem preserves differences. If Babel seeks domination, Jerusalem creates belonging.
There may be an element that at first appears secondary but carries deeper meaning. The encyclical is published not only on the one hundred and thirty-fifth anniversary of Rerum Novarum. It is also promulgated the day after Pentecost. It is difficult to consider such a coincidence irrelevant. If the reference to Rerum Novarum places the document within the great journey of Catholic Social Teaching, the timing of Pentecost adds another dimension. At Babel, human beings seek a single language. They seek uniformity, control, and power. At Pentecost, something different happens. A new language is not born. A language made new is born. Each person continues to hear in their own language and history. The Spirit does not eliminate differences. It makes them understandable. Unity does not arise from uniformity but from communion.
Perhaps artificial intelligence itself can be read through this perspective. It may become the new language of humanity. Anna Rowlands observed that every major technological transformation opens new possibilities for communication and encounter. The question is not simply whether to use this language or not. The question is what spirit will inhabit it. Christians may be called to transform a new language into a language made new, that is, an evangelised language. A language capable of safeguarding what is human, creating relationships instead of isolation, fostering encounter instead of domination, and opening spaces for truth and hope instead of feeding only speed, control, and power.
Leo XIV therefore asks a question that runs throughout the encyclical. What are we building?
History does not appear as an automatic mechanism already written. The encyclical speaks of a great construction site of our age. We are called to live within this site with freedom and responsibility. We are not passive spectators of the transformations taking place. We are builders. The future does not simply happen. It is built through concrete decisions. Humanity is not crushed by inevitable processes. Human beings still possess the freedom to direct history.
The issue becomes even clearer when the document addresses the theme of human dignity. The encyclical insists on the ontological dignity of the person. Dignity does not derive from success, productivity, or social usefulness. It does not depend on intellectual capacities. It belongs to every human being simply because he or she exists.
The implications are enormous. An artificial system may classify data, construct predictions, recognise patterns, and identify correlations. It cannot determine the value of a person.
The encyclical then introduces another theme that occupies a central place in the text, namely truth. Leo XIV observes that the problem of AI concerns not only what we are able to do but also what we are able to believe. Truth is described as a common good and not as the property of those who possess greater power or visibility. The risk does not consist simply in the presence of false information. There is a deeper issue. Digital platforms can create environments in which what is most visible automatically becomes what appears most true.
For this reason, the encyclical speaks of a true ecology of communication. Rules are needed, along with transparency, serious journalism, critical thinking, and spaces in which dialogue and verification of facts truly matter.
Alongside truth, the educational dimension also emerges strongly. One of the most interesting observations concerns education in the age of AI. Educating people in the use of artificial intelligence also means teaching them when and for what purposes not to use it. The speed with which we now obtain answers risks extinguishing something essential: the desire to ask questions in the first place.
At this point another question emerges, one that directly concerns the mission of the Church. What does it mean to evangelise in the age of artificial intelligence? It does not simply mean using new tools or new platforms. It means proclaiming the Gospel within a culture that increasingly interprets reality through data, algorithms, and measurable performance. Evangelising today may mean reminding people that they are more than their digital profile, more than their measurable achievements, and more than their data. There are fundamental dimensions of human experience that cannot be reduced to an algorithm, such as love, forgiveness, gratuity, compassion, and hope.
Finally, one of the most dramatic themes of the entire document emerges, namely the relationship between artificial intelligence and war. Here the theme of the age of force returns. War slowly risks becoming something normal. The language of absolute security and power tends to replace that of diplomacy, cooperation, and the patient construction of peace. Artificial intelligence may accelerate this process by making conflict faster, more impersonal, and more distant from moral responsibility.
In his public remarks, Leo XIV used a very powerful image when he stated that artificial intelligence must be disarmed. This expression does not mean eliminating technology or stopping progress. It means removing these instruments from the logic of force and domination. No algorithm can make war morally acceptable. No machine can assume the ethical weight of a human life.
At the end, Magnifica Humanitas brings everything back to a very simple question. It is not about the machine. It is about us. Are we building ever more powerful tools, or are we building more human beings?
Dr Claudio Betti is a historian and director of Australian Catholic University’s Rome Campus.
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