Newly elected Pope Leo XIV has held his first meeting with the world’s cardinals, identifying artificial intelligence (AI) as one of the most pressing issues facing humanity. He warned that artificial intelligence presents serious challenges to the defence of “human dignity, justice and labour.” In his address, he drew a parallel with Pope Leo XIII […]
Newly elected Pope Leo XIV has held his first meeting with the world’s cardinals, identifying artificial intelligence (AI) as one of the most pressing issues facing humanity.
He warned that artificial intelligence presents serious challenges to the defence of “human dignity, justice and labour.”
In his address, he drew a parallel with Pope Leo XIII (1878–1903), who in 1891 issued an open letter to Catholics titled Rerum Novarum (“Of Revolutionary Change”), addressing the impact of the Industrial Revolution on workers’ lives.
The new pontiff likened that document to today’s concerns about AI: “In our own day, the Church offers everyone the treasury of its social teaching in response to another industrial revolution and to developments in the field of artificial intelligence that pose new challenges for the defence of human dignity, justice, and labour.”
Pope Leo – born Robert Prevost – was confirmed as the 266th Bishop of Rome, another name for the Pope, during the 2025 papal conclave following the death of his predecessor Pope Francis. Leo is the first pope to be born in the USA and only the second person from an English-language speaking country to hold the role of the head of the Catholic Church.
Pope Francis, who died aged 88 on April 21, had become increasingly outspoken on the risks posed by AI. He called for an international treaty to regulate its use and warned that it should not be employed in decision-making.
Key choices, Francis said, must “always be left to the human person,” as humans “in their hearts are capable of deciding,” rather than relying on a “technical” choice “among several possibilities based either on well-defined criteria or on statistical inferences,” as an AI would do.
Pope Leo XIV also paid tribute to Francis’s example: “It has been clearly seen in the example of so many of my predecessors, and most recently by Pope Francis himself, with his example of complete dedication to service and to sober simplicity of life, his abandonment to God throughout his ministry and his serene trust at the moment of his return to the Father’s house.”
He concluded: “Let us take up this precious legacy and continue on the journey, inspired by the same hope that is born of faith.”
