'Disarm' AI to protect against new forms of slavery, Pope Leo warns

Pope Leo XIV called for robust regulation of artificial intelligence on Monday and for its developers to work for the common good rather than profit. 

"Artificial intelligence needs to be disarmed," Leo said. "The word is strong, I know, but deliberately chosen because this moment needs words capable of attracting attention, awakening consciences, and indicating paths forward for humanity."

In his first encyclical, titled Magnifica Humanitas - or Magnificent Humanity - Leo also apologised for the Catholic Church's role in slavery. He said with the advent of AI, the world is once again in danger of normalising the exploitation of humans. 

It is "impossible not to feel deep sorrow when contemplating the immense suffering and humiliation endured by so many," Leo wrote in the document.

"If technology promises emancipation, yet produces new forms of global subordination, it stands in contradiction to the fundamental principle of human dignity. The fight against new forms of slavery is a decisive test for the ethical discernment of AI."

Originally letters to the Pope's bishops, encyclicals are now seen as outlining the position of the Catholic Church on a major issue.  

In the text, Leo denounced the “culture of power” driving the AI race, especially in developing ever more sophisticated methods of remote warfare.

He declared that it was “not permissible” to entrust irreversible, lethal decisions to AI systems, setting up another flash point between the American pope and the Trump administration, which has worked aggressively to deregulate AI development.

Experts in the tech industry, academia and Catholic morality said the document will likely become a benchmark in the debate over AI, a point of reference for policymakers, researchers and ordinary folk alike.

It comes as the near-daily developments in the technology trigger concerns rise over AI replacing human jobs and even human intelligence.

Engaging Silicon Valley

The pope presented the text at a Vatican launch Monday that featured Christopher Olah, co-founder of Anthropic, which is currently locked in a legal battle with the Trump administration over access to its AI technology.

The Vatican decided to involve Anthropic as part of its decade-long effort to engage Silicon Valley in dialogue over the human cost of AI.

"We need more of the world, religious communities, civil society, scholars, governments, and indeed all people of goodwill, to do what His Holiness has done here," Olah said. "To take seriously, to look closely, and to push events in a better direction. We need informed critics who will tell the labs when we are failing. We need moral voices that the incentives cannot bend."

In his text, Leo repeatedly blasted the concentration of power and data in the hands of so few people in the private sector as a danger, especially to children and the most vulnerable, and called for external regulation of their work.

“It is not enough to invoke ethics in the abstract; robust legal frameworks, independent oversight, informed users and a political system that does not abdicate its responsibility are required,” he wrote.

“A more moral AI is not enough if that morality is determined by a few.”

Leo appealed several times to AI developers and political leaders responsible for regulating them to slow down and reflect on what they are doing. AI competitors OpenAI and Anthropic are the second- and third-most valuable US private companies, each valued at hundreds of billions of dollars, more than the GDP of many nations.

In its strongest chapters, Leo denounced how AI had helped accelerate the “normalisation of war” by desensitising people to its cost. He didn’t name specific conflicts, but cited “opposing imperialisms, between powers that wish to preserve their supremacy, and those that aspire to seize that supremacy.”

He demanded transparency and accountability by AI developers so that the chain of decision-making command in ordering strikes with AI weaponry is always known. He declared that the Catholic Church’s “just war” theory, which provides specific criteria for when force can be justified, was now “outdated” given the technological advances of warfare.

“The pursuit of greater profits cannot justify choices that systematically sacrifice jobs, because the human person is an end, not a means, and the economic order must remain subordinate to human dignity and the common good,” Leo wrote.