Pope Leo XIV to publish encyclical on artificial intelligence May 25

VATICAN CITY — Pope Leo XIV’s first encyclical, “Magnifica Humanitas,” will be published May 25, addressing artificial intelligence and the protection of human dignity, the Vatican announced.

Pope Leo signed the encyclicalon May 15, the 135th anniversary of “Rerum Novarum,” Pope Leo XIII’s foundational 1891 social encyclical on labor and capital written during the first Industrial Revolution.

The pope will attend the Vatican press conference to mark the publication of the social encyclical, along with a tech founder from one of the world’s fastest growing AI companies.

Christopher Olah, co-founder of the artificial intelligence company Anthropic, which developed the AI large language model (LLM) named Claude, will speak on a panel presenting the document at the Vatican’s Synod Hall on May 25 at 11:30 a.m local time.

Pope Leo has expressed interest in the issue of artificial intelligence and the dignity of work since the first week of his pontificate.

“In our own day, the Church offers to everyone the treasury of her social teaching in response to another industrial revolution and to developments in the field of artificial intelligence that pose new challenges for the defense of human dignity, justice and labor,” Pope Leo XIV said two days after his election.

Pope Leo has referenced AI in speeches, messages and interviews in his first year, leading Time magazine to include him on its 2025 list of the world’s most influential people in artificial intelligence, with the magazine describing him as a spiritual counterweight to Silicon Valley.

Pope Leo has addressed the issue of AI in venues ranging from a sports stadium packed with teenagers, whom he told to use AI “in such a way that if it disappeared tomorrow, you would still know how to think,” to a gathering of legislators from 68 countries, where he insisted that artificial intelligence is a tool meant to serve human beings, not replace them. The pope has also warned priests not to use chatbots to write their homilies and expressed concern for AI’s potential effect on children’s “intellectual and neurological development.”

The pope’s 2026 message for the 60th World Day of Social Communications, published in January, has been his most robust document on AI and protecting human dignity to date. In the papal message, he underlined that by “simulating human voices and faces, wisdom and knowledge, consciousness and responsibility, empathy and friendship,” AI systems “encroach upon the deepest level of communication, that of human relationships.”

“The ability to access vast amounts of data and information should not be confused with the ability to derive meaning and value from it. The latter requires a willingness to confront the mystery and core questions of our existence,” Pope Leo said in a December speech to participants at an AI conference.

“It will therefore be essential to teach young people to use these tools with their own intelligence, ensuring that they open themselves to the search for truth.”

Pope approves creation of interdicasterial commission on AI

Pope Leo approved the creation of an Interdicasterial Commission on Artificial Intelligence in a rescript released May 16. The rescript was signed by Cardinal Michael Czerny, prefect of the Dicastery for Integral Human Development, which will coordinate the work of the commission for the first year.

The commission is made up of representatives from seven Vatican bodies: the Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development, the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, the Dicastery for Culture and Education, the Dicastery for Communication, the Pontifical Academy for Life, the Pontifical Academy of Sciences and the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences.

Each of these institutions will be in charge of coordinating the commission in turns for one-year terms, which can be renewed. The pope would then decide the next body that will lead the works of the commission.

Isabella H. de Carvalho, OSV News, contributed to this story