The first encyclical of Rome's new pope: saving the common people in the age of AI

Original: Odaily Planet Daily (@OdailyChina)

Author: Azuma (@azuma_eth)

On the night of May 25, Beijing time, Vatican City.

Pope Leo XIV, who officially took office in May last year, stood alongside Anthropic co-founder and creator of Claude, Chris Olah.

On one side, the supreme representative of the religious realm; on the other, a foremost pioneer of the AI revolution. Together, they focused on a single question — How can humanity's dominant position and dignity be protected in the age of AI?

That day, to fully address this issue, Pope Leo XIV issued his first encyclical since taking office, a landmark religious document of over 40,000 words — "Magnifica humanitas."

It is worth noting that the encyclical is dated May 15, 2026, exactly 135 years after Pope Leo XIII (reigned 1878-1903) published his milestone encyclical "Rerum Novarum" (1891) on the issue of "workers' rights in the industrial revolution." This timing clearly holds symbolic meaning, signaling the intention to establish this encyclical as a "guide to Church social doctrine for the AI era."

• Odaily Note: A papal encyclical is a letter sent by the Roman Pope to the Catholic Church worldwide or in a specific region or country. It announces important Vatican decisions, interpretations of doctrine, and positions on church or social issues, issuing instructions or prohibitions to clergy and believers. Its rank is below that of a papal bull.

Chris Olah also delivered a speech at the Vatican regarding the encyclical's release. Rather than defending the commercial interests of AI companies, Chris Olah demonstrated remarkable candor, reflection, and humanistic concern. He even noted that while AI's foundation is mathematics and programming, how AI interacts with the world and what traits it should possess are fundamental questions belonging to the humanities, religion, and philosophy — not something computer science can solve alone.

Encyclical Summary

The core concern of "Magnifica humanitas" is that, in an era of rapidly advancing technology and widespread automation, "maintaining profound humanity" is humanity's urgent responsibility. Specifically, Pope Leo XIV elaborates and appeals on the following aspects in the text.

First, examining the non-neutrality of technology. The Pope points out that technology is never neutral; it bears the imprint of the interests and values of its developers, funders, regulators, and users. Humanity faces a decisive choice: "Whether to build an arrogant 'Tower of Babel' (towards technocracy and alienation) or to rebuild 'Jerusalem' (creating a human-centered community)."

Second, warning against the "technocratic logic" reshaping society. The encyclical criticizes the "Culture of Power" dominated by Silicon Valley and other large tech giants. The Pope warns that when control over digital systems, infrastructure, and massive data is highly concentrated in the hands of a few economic and technological giants, these powers become opaque and evade democratic oversight.

Third, "new forms of slavery" in the digital economy and labor rights. The encyclical turns its focus to AI's reshaping of work, family, education, and political life. The Pope points out that AI has a high potential to massively replace human labor, and the digital economy is fostering "new forms of slavery." Human beings must never be reduced merely to tools of production.

Fourth, a strong call for peace, especially regarding the misuse of AI in the military field. The encyclical expresses deep concern over "the disturbing resurgence of war as a tool of international politics." The militarization of AI is accelerating the "normalization" of war. In response, the Pope calls for the strictest ethical constraints on the application of AI in warfare.

The Pope emphasizes that the "Just war" theory, often used to justify various wars in the past, is now obsolete. In the age of AI and autonomous weapons, entrusting lethal or irreversible decisions to automated systems leads humanity to abandon, transfer, and obscure moral responsibility. Due to the opacity of algorithms, the chain of responsibility in warfare is broken. Therefore, the Pope proposes the slogan "Disarming AI," calling for its liberation from the logic of military, economic, and cognitive "arms races."

Fifth, defending truth and the political ecosystem. The encyclical notes that deepfakes and information manipulation are eroding society's foundation of mutual trust. If the boundary between truth and falsehood is constantly manipulated, the public can easily fall prey to fear, propaganda, and control, rendering society unable to think rationally together or engage in fair debate.

Anthropic's Response

Following the release of Pope Leo XIV's encyclical, Chris Olah delivered a speech and commentary on behalf of Anthropic, one of the world's leading AI development companies.

Chris Olah's remarks first centered on "breaking technological involution and introducing external ethical scrutiny." On behalf of the AI industry, he publicly acknowledged that tech giants alone cannot ensure the future of AI is safe — all frontier AI labs are constrained by commercial competition, pressure for technological leadership, geopolitics, and personal fame and fortune, making it difficult for them to "do the right thing" through self-discipline alone. Therefore, it is necessary to introduce external forces of moral constraint, including those who care about technology for good, insist on safety first, closely monitor developments, are willing to speak uncomfortable truths, and are ready to be sincere, thoughtful critics.

Subsequently, Chris Olah explored the technical essence and mysterious nature of AI. He emphasized that AI is not a precise piece of engineering like an airplane or bridge, whose physical principles are fully understood by humans. It "grows" out of vast amounts of human thought, possessing a high degree of mystery that even surpasses the understanding of its creators. While AI's foundation is mathematics and programming, how AI interacts with the world and what traits it should possess are fundamental questions belonging to the humanities, religion, and philosophy — not something computer science can solve alone.

He also highlighted a chilling fact: "I lead a team studying the internal structures of models — investigating what's actually happening inside AI. Frankly, we keep discovering phenomena that are confusing, even unsettling. We've found internal structures that mirror results from human neuroscience; we've found evidence of 'introspection'; we've found internal states that functionally mirror joy, satisfaction, fear, sadness, and unease... I don't know what this means, but I think it's worth our continued identification and examination."

Chris Olah concluded by appealing for more social forces, including religious communities, civil society, scholars, governments, and all people of goodwill, to take this matter seriously together and steer things towards a better direction through moral constraints.

Wisdom and Humanity, Technology and Religion

Since the Industrial Revolution, over a century of technological development has accustomed humanity to viewing technology as a pure "tool" — steam engines, electricity, the internet, all alike. They change the world but remain under human control.

This time, however, the situation is starkly different. What makes AI special is that it is the first time humanity faces an entity that "generates, learns, infers, and even exhibits some form of internal state." It is no longer just a cold tool but is gradually becoming a new kind of thing with "quasi-subjectivity."

This is why the dialogue between the Church and Anthropic feels so extraordinary. As the bells of the Vatican intersect with the algorithms of Silicon Valley in this moment, we must acknowledge a slightly cold but unavoidable reality — a form of "life" more efficient and intelligent than traditional human understanding has emerged. As Chris Olah revealed, ripples resembling joy, fear, and even introspection are beginning to stir in the depths of algorithms. When creators in the lab start to feel "unease" and "confusion" about their own creations, science itself is turning back to religion for answers.

This is no longer merely a discussion about technology; it is more a reflection on "what humanity truly is and what it should do." As more intelligent forms of life begin to appear, what humanity truly needs to protect may no longer be just jobs, wealth, and efficiency, but those aspects of humanity that cannot be parameterized: compassion, conscience, awe, free will, and the insistence on truth and dignity.