Pope Leo XIV’s new encyclical, Magnifica Humanitas (“Magnificent Humanity”), has drawn widespread praise for its warning about artificial intelligence, but its deeper message reaches far beyond technology. In the document, the pope calls for AI to be “disarmed” and kept from dominating humanity, urging stronger regulation to protect justice, human relationships, labor conditions, public discourse, and international affairs. He also warns that AI’s energy-intensive systems require more sustainable solutions to reduce environmental damage and safeguard “our common home.”
Yet the encyclical is not simply a critique of Big Tech. Leo argues that AI reflects and accelerates preexisting social problems rooted in economic inequality, spiritual blindness, and a culture that prizes efficiency, individualism, and technological power above human dignity. He emphasizes that the apparent speed and convenience of AI depend on vast chains of human labor, natural resources, and energy infrastructure. Behind every seamless digital response, he notes, are workers often paid minimal wages and, in some regions, children and adolescents laboring in dangerous conditions to extract rare earth materials. For Leo, this is not an abstract issue but a moral one, amounting to a modern form of slavery from which many users of AI ultimately benefit.
The pope’s argument extends to the habits of those in wealthy, stable societies who rely on frictionless data and automation to become more efficient, entertained, and less burdened by difficult work such as reading, studying, and understanding. He suggests that blaming AI alone obscures broader human responsibility. According to Leo, the crisis is not created by technology itself but by humanity’s willingness to organize life around systems that devalue people, memory, and solidarity.
To respond, Leo calls for a “civilization of love” built through small, steady acts of fidelity that resist dehumanization. He frames this vision through biblical imagery, contrasting the humble rebuilding of Jerusalem in the Book of Nehemiah with the failed pride of the Tower of Babel. The encyclical ultimately presents humanity as “magnificent” because of its creation in the image of God and, in Christian belief, through the incarnation of God in human form in Jesus Christ. From that perspective, Leo argues, no machine can create a conscience, a self-giving heart, or the capacity to discern good from evil.
The encyclical’s central question is therefore not merely what to do about AI, but what it means to be human in an age increasingly shaped by automation, efficiency, and spiritual disconnection.
