May 26, 2026 — Pope Leo XIV published his landmark encyclical on artificial intelligence “Magnifica Humanitas” (“Magnificent Humanity”) on May 25, comparing the attempt to build an AI future that excludes God to the “Tower of Babel.” He warned that in the era of AI, human dignity is “threatened by new forms of dehumanization.”
Fr. James Martin, SJ, editor at large at America magazine, called the encyclical “the most cogent Catholic critique of capitalism that I have ever read.”
He noted that the pope centers our attention not on profits or progress, but on human dignity. “Pope Leo reminds us that a focus on profits alone means that the human being is sometimes seen as expendable: People are casually laid off, some lose the ability to support their families, and often whole communities are affected by layoffs and closures. An economic system that looks upon these results as simply inevitable needs to be critiqued.”
Fr. Martin added that the “new encyclical offers a master class in Catholic social teaching and reminds us that these tenets must guide all economic decisions, including decisions about the backdrop of this new teaching: artificial intelligence.”
Along with its focus on human dignity, Kim Daniels, director of Georgetown University’s Initiative on Catholic Social Thought and Public Life, said that “Magnifica Humanitas” lifts up two other principles that deserve special attention: the dignity of work and care for the vulnerable.
“These are not abstract principles,” Daniels said. “They are criteria to shape concrete action, by each of us and by the policymakers, investors, legislators and corporate leaders who are deciding how AI is built, deployed and governed.”
Cardinal Michael Czerny, SJ, prefect of the Vatican’s Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development, said that with the encyclical, Pope Leo has “called our attention to a huge problem that all of us have been more or less aware of, but many of us have been afraid to look at. He has really encouraged us on the one hand to be proud of this great achievement, but to be careful and especially to be responsible.”
Léocadie Lushombo, a professor of theological ethics at the Jesuit School of Theology of Santa Clara University in Berkeley, California, was part of the panel at the Vatican on May 25 for the encyclical’s release.
Lushombo said that it offers warnings about the effects of AI on humanity, especially in the Global South. She noted the encyclicals’ concerns regarding the physical and environmental toll of AI infrastructure, as child labor is often used in the extraction of rare earth elements in the developing world.
She also highlighted the pope’s criticism of “a technological development that represses human dignity and widens the gap between the rich and the poor, as AI is doing, following the patterns of economic globalization.”
“Technology should serve human flourishing and human dignity, not as a form of control over consciences,” she said.
Fr. Tom Reese, SJ, senior analyst for Religion News Service, said that Pope Leo “hit it out of the ballpark” with his first encyclical by addressing not only “artificial intelligence but more widely with digital technology and its impact on the real world we live in.”
“Leo argues Catholic social teaching can help us know how to deal with these technologies and their potential for disruption,” he wrote.
In the encyclical, Pope Leo also made a historic apology for the Holy See’s role in legitimizing slavery and for its failure to condemn it for centuries. He wrote:
“This constitutes a wound in Christian memory, one from which we cannot consider ourselves detached. It is impossible not to feel deep sorrow when contemplating the immense suffering and humiliation endured by so many in stark contrast to their immeasurable dignity as persons infinitely loved by the Lord. For this, in the name of the Church, I sincerely ask for pardon.”
Fr. Christopher Kellerman, SJ, secretary of Justice and Ecology for the Jesuit Conference of Canada and the United States and author of “All Oppression Shall Cease: A History of Slavery, Abolitionism, and the Catholic Church,” welcomed the apology but said more needed to be done to further acknowledge how the Catholic Church legitimized and expanded slavery.
“Pope Leo has strengthened the moral credibility of the church with this admission and apology today,” Fr. Kellerman said. “Hopefully a future document will explain in more detail the church’s involvement with slaveholding. As a scholar I have some quibbles with the wording, but this is a truly remarkable moment.”
Brian Patrick Green, director of technology ethics at Santa Clara University’s Markkula Center for Applied Ethics, called the encyclical “a landmark opportunity for the world to look at a new technology and really think about what it is for.
“What is the purpose of this technology? What is it supposed to do in the world? How can it help people? What do we need to do in order to make sure that this technology does the best that it can do for the most people in the world?”
