What Pope Leo has warned about AI – and why it matters | Religious Matters

Pope Leo XIV says artificial intelligence they must be “disarmed” as world leaders and private companies increase the use of technology in many human activities, including war.

On Monday, in his first papal book, Magnifica humanitas: On Safeguarding the Human Person in the Time of Artificial Intelligence, the pope warned of “a race for the ever-increasing power of algorithms and large datasets” driven by “the desire for political or commercial control”.

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The head of the Catholic Church presented the letter to the Vatican along with AI experts, including Christopher Olah, who founded the US-based AI organization Anthropic.

Letters written by the pope are sent to Catholic bishops. In recent decades, it has become one of the most important teachings from the pope to the church’s 1.4 billion members.

What did the pope say in his first book, and why is it important? Here’s what we know:

What did the pope say about AI?

Since his election in May 2025, Leo has made the theme of creative wisdom the cornerstone of his papacy.

According to The Vatican News, spoke in November about how technology should be used effectively in the health sector. A month later, he he said AI should not hinder new generations and added that it is important to “restore and encourage” young people “confidence in the human ability to lead the development of new technologies, such as artificial intelligence, and not see this development as following an inevitable path”.

But by making AI the main focus of his first book, the pope has turned his concerns into religious guidance to be recognized throughout the world’s largest Christian denomination, to which half of the world’s Christians belong.

In his nearly 43,000-word letter, the pope insisted that AI should not be left in private hands and called on policymakers to protect workers’ rights and protect children from the technology. He also encouraged AI companies to limit their competition.

Giving a “special celebration” to those who are developing AI, he said: “Developers have a certain moral and spiritual responsibility, because every choice reflects a human vision.”

“What is needed is political intervention that can slow things down when things are going well,” Leo said.

Olah, who spoke at the presentation of the encyclical, said the AI ​​industry works “within incentives and constraints that can sometimes conflict with doing the right thing”. He agreed that AI developers should focus on ensuring that there is no loss of many jobs due to technology and answer the unresolved question of how to interpret the most complex and sometimes opaque systems.

The Pope called for “strong laws, independent supervision, well-informed users and a political system that does not abdicate its responsibility”.

“Artificial intelligence now wants to be disarmed, freed from the logic that turns it into a tool of domination, exclusion, and death,” he said. “Like nuclear power, it should be universal.”

The Pope also warned that AI is causing war.

In March, the US military it has been confirmed the use of “various” AI weapons in the US-Israeli war against Iran as concern grew over the increase in civilian casualties in the conflict. In 2024, Al Jazeera and other media revealed that AI systems affiliated with Israel, such as Lavender and Gospel, helped create thousands of soldiers in Gaza.

“For this reason, the development and use of AI in warfare must be subject to the strictest restrictions, to ensure respect for human dignity and the sanctity of life and to prevent competition for the development of such weapons,” the Pope wrote.

He also sounded a warning against AI-powered weapons, saying it is “not permissible to assign lethal decisions” to the technology.

The Pope has repeatedly clashed with the White House over the US-Israel war against Iran and the use of religion to justify conflict.

The idea of ​​a “just war” recently launched by the administration of US President Donald Trump is “outdated”, Leo wrote, adding that “there is no way to make war legitimate.”

How important is the Pope’s opinion on AI?

In recent years, Silicon Valley has been investing heavily in AI. In January, Amazon, the second largest employer in the US after Walmart, resigned 16,000 workers, the latest round of layoffs due to AI. In October, The New York Times report that the company had plans to “replace more than half a million jobs with robots”.

Apart from job losses, AI data centers, which train and run AI models for jobs, have also threatened to drive people out of their homes in countries like India.

Also, according to UNICEF, “the increasing number of AI-powered photo and video tools that create baby bedding shows the number of dangers to children through digital technology.

In light of this, the warning about AI is the first time the pope has pushed back against Big Tech, which was the main focus of the entire book.

Past popes have spoken about technology in meetings and in parts of their encyclicals.

In his 2015 book, which focuses on the environment and climate change, Pope Francis dedicated a section on technology and talked about how technology should benefit the world and not increase division and inequality.

In October 2021, speaking from the Vatican to the World Meeting of Popular Movements via video, Francis also said: “It is clear that technology can be a good tool, and it is a good tool, that allows discussions like this, and more, but it cannot replace our communication.

“In the name of God, I ask the tech giants to stop exploiting human weakness, people’s insecurities, in order to make profit without caring about the spread of hate speech, self-decoration, fake news, conspiracy theories and political manipulation,” added Francis.

In his 2009 book, Pope Benedict XVI also explored the development of technology in another area and warned that it should not promote dehumanization.

What did Leo say again?

Although Leo’s letter was largely about AI, he also explained the role of the Catholic Church in slavery and “sincerely asked for forgiveness” in the name of the Vatican.

The Vatican has emphasized that it has always supported the dignity of all people as children of God. But the list of instructions from the 15th century in the Vatican allowed the Portuguese rulers to conquer Africa and the Americas and enslave non-Christians.

Former popes apologized for Christian involvement in the transatlantic slave trade. But no pope has ever publicly acknowledged or apologized for the work done by previous popes in tolerating the colonial rule and slavery of European rulers.

Leo wrote: “It is impossible not to feel great sadness when we think about the suffering and humiliation that many people are facing in contrast to their incomparable honor as people who are dearly loved by the Lord.”

“For this, in the name of the church, I sincerely ask for forgiveness,” he added.

“This is a wound in the Christian memory, which we cannot consider ourselves to be distant from,” he added.

Shannen Dee Williams, a historian at the University of Dayton in the state of Ohio in the US and author of the history of American Black Catholic nuns in 2022 called Subversive Habits, welcomed the apology as “a big step towards the kind of truth-telling and revenge that many Catholics have prayed for and witnessed”.

“The Catholic Church has never been an innocent person in the history of white supremacy,” Williams told the Associated Press.

“Black Catholics have waited a long time to hear the Vatican speak honestly about the church’s role in the Atlantic slave trade and slavery in public speaking and adding that there are anti-discrimination measures going on around the world today.”