{"id":465824,"date":"2026-05-25T06:48:09","date_gmt":"2026-05-25T06:48:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/465824\/"},"modified":"2026-05-25T06:48:09","modified_gmt":"2026-05-25T06:48:09","slug":"pope-leos-first-encyclical-to-focus-on-ai-concerns","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/465824\/","title":{"rendered":"Pope Leo&#8217;s first encyclical to focus on AI concerns"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Pope Leo XIV&#8217;s much anticipated first encyclical Magnifica Humanitas, or Magnificent Humanity, focusing on artificial intelligence is due to be published today by the Vatican.<\/p>\n<p>It was signed by the pope on 15 May to mark the 135th anniversary of an encyclical presented by the last pontiff, who took the name Leo &#8211; Pope Leo XIII.<\/p>\n<p>Rerum Novarum addressed the social and economic upheavals brought on by the Industrial Revolution in the late 1800s.<\/p>\n<p>Today, Pope Leo XIV will address the latest revolution &#8211; Artificial Intelligence.<\/p>\n<p>In a first for the Vatican, Pope Leo will be in the Synod Hall for the publication of the document which will be presented to the Curia, diplomats and the media.<\/p>\n<p>The presentation of an encyclical by a pope is a new departure, indicating the importance of the document to the pontiff.<\/p>\n<p>There is significant interest in who will join the pope for the presentation.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"The Anthropic logo appears on the screen of a smartphone placed on a laptop keyboard.\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/00240c1b-614.jpg\"\/><br \/>\nThe co-founder of Anthropic will attend the event<\/p>\n<p>A panel of cardinals and theologians will have the co-founder of one of the most influential AI companies, Anthropic, seated alongside them.<\/p>\n<p>Christopher Olah co-founded the US company &#8211; which is behind the AI system Claude &#8211; in 2021.<\/p>\n<p>He has described Anthropic as an AI lab focused on the safety of large models.<\/p>\n<p>By placing Mr Olah on a panel alongside cardinals and theologians, some would argue there are politics and ethics at play.<\/p>\n<p>Anthropic drew the ire of the Trump administration earlier this year after it rejected a request from the Pentagon to unconditional use of its Claude AI models.<\/p>\n<p>It resulted in the US president demanding the government &#8220;immediately&#8221; stop using Anthropic technology.<\/p>\n<p>Anthropic vowed to sue over the &#8220;intimidation&#8221; and insisted its technology should not be used for the mass surveillance of US citizens or deployed in fully autonomous weapons systems.<\/p>\n<p>Earlier this month, the Pentagon confirmed it had reached agreements with seven AI companies &#8211; excluding Anthropic &#8211; to deploy their advanced capabilities on the US Department of Defense\u2019s classified networks as it seeks to diversify the range of AI companies working across the military.<\/p>\n<p>Some observers believe Mr Olah\u2019s presence at the publication of the encyclical could add fuel to the public dispute between Pope Leo and Donald Trump, which intensified in recent weeks.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Pope Leo speaks at Mass\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/00241002-614.jpg\"\/><br \/>\nPope Leo said AI investments and high-tech weaponry were leading the world into a &#8216;spiral of annihilation&#8217;<\/p>\n<p>Last week, Pope Leo strongly criticised the use of AI in autonomous weapons and the militarisation of new technologies in ongoing global conflicts at a speech in Rome\u2019s La Sapienza University.<\/p>\n<p>He said AI investments and high-tech weaponry were leading the world into a &#8220;spiral of annihilation&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p>The Vatican has been wise to the power of artificial intelligence for some time.<\/p>\n<p>Technology professionals based in Silicon Valley alerted the Holy See to what was coming as far back as 2016.<\/p>\n<p>Those in Silicon Valley suggested that senior people in the Vatican, including Bishop Paul Tighe who is from Co Meath, start thinking about it.<\/p>\n<p>Engagements between the Vatican and representatives from Silicon Valley have continued for a decade.<\/p>\n<p>The Vatican recognised the benefits of AI, particularly around medicine and education.<\/p>\n<p>However, it is clear it also has concerns over its exploitation.<\/p>\n<p>The pope has expressed concern over job losses as a result of AI.<\/p>\n<p>Ironically, Mr Olah\u2019s company is currently seeking out new offices in Dublin to expand its EU Headquarters.<\/p>\n<p>In March, the IDA announced that Anthropic had announced plans to significantly expand its Dublin presence over the coming year.<\/p>\n<p>Despite this, figures from the Central Statistics Office last week showed a fall in employment levels in the tech sector.<\/p>\n<p>Apart from labour and threats to jobs, the encyclical will address other topics such as justice, peace and morality.<\/p>\n<p>The lengthy document will be the first signpost in Catholic teaching on the subject of AI and is likely to shape Pope Leo\u2019s pontificate in the years ahead.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Pope Leo XIV&#8217;s much anticipated first encyclical Magnifica Humanitas, or Magnificent Humanity, focusing on artificial intelligence is due&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":465825,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[220,218,219,61,60,80],"class_list":["post-465824","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-artificial-intelligence","tag-ai","tag-artificial-intelligence","tag-artificialintelligence","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-technology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/465824","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=465824"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/465824\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/465825"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=465824"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=465824"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=465824"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}