Pope Leo XIV Warns AI Could Hand Power to a Few at Humanity’s Expense
On December 5, 2025, Pope Leo XIV addressed a Vatican conference on “Artificial Intelligence and Care of Our Common Home,” organized by the Centesimus Annus Pro Pontifice Foundation and the Strategic Alliance of Catholic Research Universities. He zeroed in on a core risk: AI piling up wealth and power among a handful of players instead of helping everyone. “How can we ensure that the development of artificial intelligence truly serves the common good and is not just used to accumulate wealth and power in the hands of a few?” he asked, according to Catholic News Agency.
Humans Over Machines
The pope pushed back against seeing people as “passive consumers of content generated by artificial technology.” We’re meant to co-work in creation, he said—drawing on our power to reflect, choose freely, love without conditions, and build real relationships. AI messes with critical thinking, discernment, learning, and connections, hitting millions daily. It also threatens openness to truth, beauty, wonder, and contemplation.
OSV News captured his point: protecting human growth is key to handling AI’s fallout, ahead of any profit grab by elites.
Protecting the Next Generation
Leo XIV focused on kids and young people, whose freedom, spirituality, intellect, and brain development are on the line. Just grabbing data isn’t wisdom—it’s about pulling meaning from it, facing life’s big questions despite cultural pushback.
- Teach youth to wield AI tools with their own smarts, chasing truth and wider horizons.
- Boost faith in human-led tech paths over “inevitable” machine takeovers.
- Help them mature with talent, generosity, and free minds—society’s future rides on it.
As Vatican News reported, this demands action from politics, business, finance, education, citizens, and faith groups—everyone gets a voice, even the overlooked.
Sanders Weighs In
Sen. Bernie Sanders shared the pope’s words on X that day, spotlighting the power concentration danger. He called for AI benefits to reach all, not just the rich. Last month, Sanders and AI expert Geoffrey Hinton warned at Georgetown that billionaire-driven AI—like investments from Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos—might skip workers unless checked. Big Tech’s “Magnificent Seven” plan nearly $400 billion on AI in 2025, per Benzinga.
The pope’s talk praised the conference’s research on AI’s business, finance, education, and communication effects, urging joint fixes over narrow interests, as noted by Cruxnow and Gaudiumpress.
