Pope Leo XIV has warned bishops about the challenges being created by artificial intelligence, biotechnology, and social media in today’s world. Source: Crux.
Speaking to the bishops of Italy yesterday, the Pontiff said these developments, along with the data economy, “are profoundly transforming our perception and experience of life.”
“In this scenario, the dignity of the human being risks being flattened or forgotten, replaced by functions, automatisms, simulations,” he said.
“But the person is not a system of algorithms: He is a creature, a relationship, a mystery,” he explained.
“I would therefore like to express a hope: That the journey of the Churches in Italy will include, in consistent symbiosis with the centrality of Jesus, the anthropological vision as an essential instrument of pastoral discernment.
“Without a living reflection on the human – in its corporeality, in its vulnerability, in its thirst for the infinite and its capacity for bonding – ethics is reduced to a code and faith risks becoming disembodied,” Leo said.
In particular, he called on bishops to “cultivate a culture of dialogue.”
“It is beautiful that all ecclesial realities – parishes, associations and movements – are spaces for intergenerational listening, for confrontation with different worlds, for care for words and relationships. Because only where there is listening can communion be born, and only where there is communion does the truth become credible. I encourage you to continue on this path,” the Pope said.
He told the bishops to look to tomorrow with serenity and to not be afraid of “courageous choices”.
“No one will be able to prevent you from being close to the people, from sharing life, from walking with the least, from serving the poor. No one will be able to prevent you from proclaiming the Gospel, and it is the Gospel that we are sent to bring, because it is what all of us, first of all, need in order to live well and be happy,” Leo said.
“Take care that the lay faithful, nourished by the Word of God and formed in the Church’s social doctrine, are protagonists of evangelisation in the workplace, in schools, in hospitals, in social and cultural environments, in the economy and in politics.”
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Bishops should be aware of the challenges posed by AI, Pope Leo says (By Charles Collins, Crux)
