Pope Leo denounces ‘culture of power’ driving rise of AI

Pope Leo denounces ‘culture of power’ driving rise of AI | Pope Leo XIV

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/may/25/pope-leo-encyclical-ai-artificial-intelligence-slavery

Publish Date: 2026-05-25 08:23:00

Pope Leo has denounced the “culture of power” driving the rapid rise of artificial intelligence while warning that the technology must be subject to the “most rigorous” ethical constraints as it infiltrates everything from work to war.

In his encyclical – the first major text on safeguarding humankind of his papacy – he also apologised for the Catholic church’s long delay in condemning slavery, describing it as “a wound in Christian memory”, and spoke of the “new forms of slavery” due to the digital economy.

In a break from tradition, Leo, who soon after being elected in May last year said he considered AI to be the biggest threat to humanity today, presented the document himself on Monday during an event at the Vatican. Among those in attendance was Christopher Olah, a co-founder of Anthropic, a US-based AI firm thatis embroiled in a lawsuit with Donald Trump’s administration over the ethics of AI.

Encyclicals are one of the highest forms of teaching from a pope to the Catholic church’s 1.4 billion members, and typically outline his priorities while highlighting the major issues in society.

In the document, called Magnifica Humanitas (Magnificent Humanity), Leo, who was born in Chicago and is the first US-born pope, referred to “a troubling revival of war as an instrument of international politics” and said AI was helping to facilitate the “normalisation of war”.

“For this reason, the development and use of AI in warfare must be subject to the most rigorous ethical constraints, to guarantee respect for human dignity and the sanctity of life and to avoid a race to develop such arms,” he wrote.

Leo urged the “disarming” of AI, while stating that some autonomous weapons systems are “practically beyond any human reach” to control.

“Disarming AI means freeing it from the mentality of ‘armed’ competition,” he wrote. “To disarm does not mean rejecting technology, but preventing it from dominating humanity,” adding…

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