Pope Leo XIV Calls for Disarming AI in Landmark Encyclical on Humanity and Technology

Most popes delegate the presentation of their first encyclical to a senior cardinal. Pope Leo XIV chose to do it himself, appearing alongside an AI developer to deliver a direct challenge to the technology industry.

Seated with Christopher Olah, co-founder of Anthropic, the pontiff released Magnifica Humanitas on May 25 — a 42,300-word document that urges governments, corporations and individuals to pause and confront a question the tech sector rarely asks: What kind of human beings are we becoming?

The answer Leo XIV fears, if current trends continue unchecked, is a society that has quietly outsourced judgment, creativity and moral conscience to machines.

Leo XIV brings an unusual perspective to the AI debate. Before entering the priesthood, he studied mathematics, a background that informs both his technical understanding of what AI can do and his clear-eyed assessment of what it cannot.

Current AI systems, he writes, imitate certain functions of human intelligence. They process data at extraordinary speed and scale, spotting patterns that would take humans years to identify. Yet they have no body, no lived experience, no capacity for joy or suffering, and no moral conscience. When an AI appears to understand or empathise, it is executing a statistical process — adapting to data — not engaging in genuine interior growth. “Learning” for these systems has nothing in common with the personal development that arises from choices, consequences and change.

This distinction, the pope argues, is not a minor philosophical point. It underpins his central warning: any governance system, business model or social norm that treats AI outputs as equivalent to human judgment commits a serious category error.

The encyclical's most memorable image is its call to “disarm” artificial intelligence.

Leo XIV uses the term deliberately. He describes today's AI development as an arms-race dynamic: corporations compete for ever-larger datasets and more powerful models, while geopolitical rivals vie for technological supremacy. The pressure to accelerate comes not from democratic debate but from the sheer momentum of competition.

Disarming AI does not mean rejecting the technology, the pope stresses. It means removing that competitive logic, ending the monopolistic grip a small group of private actors hold over platforms, data and computing power, and subjecting development to genuine public discussion. The aim is technology that serves the full diversity of human cultures rather than the narrow commercial or strategic interests of a few.

The document is concrete about where this power is already at work. Algorithms now influence who gets job interviews, credit approvals, public services and online reputation. These decisions have always required — and must continue to require — distinctly human qualities: compassion, contextual judgment and the recognition that people can change. A machine cannot show mercy; it can only optimise for its assigned variables.

Environmental impact receives sharp attention. Training and operating large language models consume massive amounts of energy and water, driving up carbon emissions and straining natural resources. Sustainable technological development, the encyclical insists, must be part of any credible path forward.

The pope also draws attention to the hidden human costs: content moderators exposed to disturbing material so models can learn, and workers in extractive industries who supply the rare-earth minerals for AI hardware. “Nothing in the world of AI is immaterial or magical,” the document states. Every instant response rests on the silent labour of millions.

At the core of Magnifica Humanitas stand two biblical metaphors that frame humanity's choice.

The Tower of Babel depicts a people united by one language, one technology and one ambition — to reach heaven by their own power. The outcome is not unity but fragmentation. Leo XIV sees the same risk in AI systems that reduce every nuance, cultural particularity and human mystery to data and metrics.

By contrast, the rebuilding of Jerusalem's walls under Nehemiah shows a community working together — families, priests, artisans and young people, each responsible for their own section. This is the model the pope commends: patient, communal, attentive to the vulnerable and grounded in something greater than efficiency.

The real issue, he writes, is not technology itself but the loves that shape human hearts.

The encyclical engages seriously with transhumanism and posthumanism — currents of thought that see technology as a means to enhance or transcend the human condition. Leo XIV acknowledges their influence on the popular imagination and their appeal in a world transformed by technological progress.

Yet he warns that any vision treating vulnerability, suffering and mortality as defects to be eliminated risks devaluing lives judged “less useful” or “less optimised”. Human worth, Catholic social teaching has long insisted, is not contingent on performance.

True human greatness, the pope argues, emerges through limitation: in compassion, care for those who cannot reciprocate, forgiveness and relationship. Christian faith points to a different form of transcendence — not technical optimisation but self-giving love received as grace.

Scholars at the crossroads of Catholic social thought and technology have welcomed the text.

Paolo Carozza, a Notre Dame law professor and member of both the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences and the Meta Oversight Board, called it “a profound and prophetic document” that speaks to all humanity. “The real question is not whether AI is good or bad, but whether the ways we develop and deploy it help individuals and communities become more humane, just and participatory — or whether they foster exclusion, control and inequality.”

Meghan Sullivan, philosopher and director of Notre Dame's Institute for Ethics and the Common Good, described it as “one of the most compelling and comprehensive treatments of AI ethics I have ever read”. She noted that Christian tradition grounds human dignity not in cognitive performance or economic output but in the simple fact of being human.

Nitesh Chawla, a Notre Dame computer scientist, highlighted the encyclical's core point: AI cannot be treated as morally neutral.

Many observers have compared the document to Pope Francis's 2015 encyclical *Laudato Si'* on the environment — initially met with scepticism in some quarters but ultimately influential in shaping global moral discourse.

The release was accompanied by a practical step. Earlier this month Leo XIV established an Interdicasterial Commission on Artificial Intelligence, drawing experts from seven Vatican departments including the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, the Pontifical Academy for Life and the Pontifical Academy of Sciences. Its mandate is to coordinate Vatican policy and foster wider dialogue.

The encyclical calls for robust legal frameworks, independent oversight and the political courage to slow development when necessary. Whether governments and technology companies will treat a papal document as more than moral guidance remains to be seen. Early reactions have been mixed: praise for its clarity from some quarters, questions from others about the role of religious voices in tech policy.

For Leo XIV the choice before societies is clear. They can build in the spirit of Babel — grandiose, efficient and ultimately dehumanising — or follow Nehemiah's patient, communal path. Technology is not the deciding factor.

The deciding factor is what we love.

Note:  Magnifica Humanitas was signed by Pope Leo XIV on May 15, 2026, to mark the 135th anniversary of Leo XIII's *Rerum Novarum*, and released publicly on May 25. The full text is available on the Vatican website.

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