‘Magnifica Humanitas’: Pope Leo’s first encyclical places AI at service of humanity, not power

Pope Leo XIV published his first encyclical, Magnifica Humanitas, May 25, warning that artificial intelligence (AI) and other technological advances pose moral challenges that could reshape humanity’s understanding of truth, work, relationships, and human dignity.“Humanity, created by God in all its grandeur, is today facing a pivotal choice: either to construct a new Tower of Babel or to build the city in which God and humanity dwell together,” the encyclical, subtitled “On Safeguarding the Human Person in the Time of Artificial Intelligence,” opens.Pope Leo signed the encyclical May 15, the 135th anniversary of Pope Leo XIII’s 1891 encyclical Rerum Novarum,...