The Pope Against Technocracy

When ChatGPT spawned from the earth in 2022, humanity was introduced to artificial intelligence slowly, then all at once. For us laypeople, its uses were humorous at first (write the “To Be or Not to Be” speech as if read by Snoop Dog). Its more concerning applications manifested later. Many of us now offload our thinking—our reasoning—onto AI because doing it ourselves is difficult and time-consuming.

Why would we talk to a friend about our problems when we can ask Claude? It’s available around the clock, and it is really nice to me. Why pray to God when we can construct our own deities? We’re now discovering that they have eyes and mouths but cannot see or speak. And we’re becoming like them, those of us who trust in them.

On May 25, 2026, the Vatican unveiled Magnifica Humanitas as the Catholic Church’s response to artificial intelligence. It was deliberately published 135 years after Pope Leo XIII’s groundbreaking encyclical Rerum Novarum, in which the pontiff laid out the Church’s vision of a just economy and the rights and dignity of laborers amid the first industrial revolution.

Pope Leo XIV’s document begins by offering striking imagery of the Tower of Babel as a preliminary way of considering AI. After the apocalyptic flood that reset humanity, Noah’s sons settled in the land of Shinar and chose to build a tower “with its tops in the heavens.” The Tower of Babel represented the most sophisticated technological project of the time—one that shirked the fear of God to exalt man’s own glory. Quickly, this project sacrificed the uniformity of a common goal for a confused diversity in which every man spoke a different language and isolated himself from those whom he believed to be his brothers. “Babel thus reveals,” says Magnifica Humanitas, “the limits of any effort that, however grandiose, arises from self-affirmation, sacrifices human dignity for efficiency and aspires to reach heaven without God’s blessing.”

What exactly, then, is the threat of AI? The Vatican does not call for its elimination—quite the opposite. As with Rerum Novarum of 1891, this new encyclical recognizes technology as an expression of the goodness in man’s heart when used for the benefit of all. AI is repeatedly described as a potentially “valuable tool”—one capable of advancing medicine, education, communication, etc.—provided it is always subordinated to the dignity of the person. Its productive capacity must serve man rather than the enrichment of a small few and the domination of our neighbor.

Magnifica Humanitas offers another biblical vision, a positive one, to consider alongside the warnings of the Tower of Babel: Nehemiah’s rebuilding of Jerusalem. After the city’s destruction and the exile of its inhabitants, Nehemiah was permitted by the Persians to return to Jerusalem and, with those he took with him, rebuild the destroyed and desecrated Holy City. Where Babel exposes the delirium of man’s lustful ambition, Nehemiah reflects humanity at its best, sharing the burden of rebuilding, distributing this meaningful labor among the people, and subordinating his own ambitions to that which glorifies God.

This is the central contrast the Vatican presents in its understanding of AI. The danger is not merely that artificial intelligence can become too powerful but that civilization will organize itself according to the builders of the Tower of Babel, where wisdom and the common good are discarded to exalt man’s creations and the wealth they create. More concretely, the Church contends that all technological progress must provide opportunities for meaningful work and the pursuit of truth rather than render men as economically disposable or dependent upon complex systems they neither control nor understand.

So, who does understand these technologies? Those we presume to be at the top of this field, like Elon Musk and Sam Altman, have said there’s a not insignificant chance that AI decimates humanity. If the intelligence we create continues to advance beyond human comprehension, the fear is that mankind itself could eventually be treated as an inefficient impediment to whatever goal a superintelligence deems superior. It’s “summoning the demon,” as Musk once said. That is an apt description.

Pope Leo XIV’s concern, however, is not that AI will usher in a Terminator-esque war of all against all. More immediate is the prospect of a civilization gradually reorganized around technocracy, in which corporate and state power, shepherded by our few knowledgeable tech experts, expand as the worth of human life diminishes.

Throughout Magnifica Humanitas runs a deep suspicion toward what the Vatican calls the “technocratic paradigm,” understood as the tendency to place our ultimate trust in technology simply for the sake of economic expansion.

When [technology] becomes the standard by which everything is judged, it begins to dictate what matters and what can be discarded, reducing creation to an object of exploitation and human beings to mere cogs in a system driven toward ever greater efficiency.

This reflection once again mandates us to recognize man’s—the worker’s—flourishing as the center of all economic life.

In Catholic social teaching, labor is never understood merely as a means of generating income. As expounded in the encyclical, “Work is not considered simply as a problem to be dealt with or a means of generating income, but a fundamental good for the person, a principle of economic activity and the key to the entire societal question.”

While AI can and should be embraced similarly to the revolutionary technologies of the past—the steam engine, mechanized production, etc.—its role must be rightly ordered toward the common good. If millions are left without meaningful participation in their own civilization, what possible good could that serve? Can cheap commodities replace the yearning in man’s soul for the purpose that work provides? AI, in the Church’s telling, is the fourth industrial revolution. It has the potential to shake the foundations of our society as the first industrial revolution did in the 19th and 20th centuries.

In today’s debate over AI, one camp sees the technology as humanity’s greatest opportunity for flourishing. Its capacity to dramatically increase efficiency can eventually generate material abundance on a scale previously unimaginable. The other camp imagines a darker possibility in which job loss runs rampant as entire sectors of white-collar labor are rendered obsolete. The former may yet prove true over time. Yet the fears surrounding mass unemployment, which Magnifica Humanitas calls a “grave evil,” are already moving from theory into reality.

Meta is manifesting this dystopian vision with its drafting—yes, literal drafting—of thousands of its employees to work on its AI project to develop the infrastructure that will eventually dislodge them. Many believe that AI is comparable to the automobile, while critics of the technology are Luddites who grasp at outdated technology simply because they fear a changing economy. But this is not a suitable comparison.

As its name suggests, artificial intelligence’s purpose is to mimic the human person and surpass their mental capabilities. When used as a tool alongside man, there are incredible opportunities to improve human life. However, what is unique about this technology is that it inevitably seeks to rob man of the opportunity to work with his mind.

It’s true, AI can often work smarter, faster, and more efficiently than human beings. But what are we left with when man sacrifices spiritual listlessness for material prosperity? And what happens when the enormous wealth created further enriches a small class of tech leaders? The pope does not suggest anything like an AI moratorium. He is urging us to avoid subjecting ourselves to “new forms of slavery.”

Catholic social teaching underscores the offensive nature of the sprawling wealth inequality that exists in developed economies. Yet it also does not kowtow to the popular demands of socialism (another doctrine condemned by the Church) where the owners of capital can be abused by the state, have their wealth unjustly confiscated, or be shot in the back in Midtown Manhattan. The Church’s premodern wisdom strikes the right balance between embracing the fruits of technological advancement and elevating the rights and dignity of man. Creative destruction has its place in a developed economy, but “if technology becomes the ultimate criterion,” Magnifica Humanitas states, “the human person risks being reduced to data, a cog in a machine or a commodity. If, however, technology is integrated with a wise perspective, it can become an instrument of growth, justice and fraternity.”

The encyclical does not offer one succinct answer on AI. It instead describes a process of “shared discernment” to determine the right course of action in which everlasting truths about human dignity encounter the concrete realities of particular cultures and moments. In encountering the truth about society and technology, it is best to encounter the truth of Christ and the Gospel. The future of AI could easily be forged upon ever-higher layers of brick and stone, in which “experts” build toward the heavens and subjugate man in the process.

Pope Leo XIV offers another path—one that breaks the chains of a cold technocracy that strips man of his dignity: “Like Nehemiah, we too are called to unite listening and courage, prayer and responsibility, so that, even when a technocratic mentality or partisan interests seem to prevail, the human city may become a more fitting place to live.”

The pope suggests that we enter the human city humbly, with eyes raised toward heaven. For our own sakes, let’s follow him in.