Pope Leo XIV cites 'developments in the field of artificial intelligence' as reason for papal name

The newly elected head of the Roman Catholic Church, Pope Leo XIV, said in one of his first speeches as Pope that the choice of his papal name was due to the current “Industrial Revolution” our world is facing, central to which are the “developments in the field of artificial intelligence.”

Pope Leo, born Robert Francis Provost, said he chose the name “mainly because Pope Leo XIII in his historic Encyclical Rerum Novarum addressed the social question in the context of the first great Industrial Revolution.”

The pope indicated that, like Pope Leo XIII led the Roman Catholic Church through the first industrial revolution, he hopes to lead it through the Industrial Revolution we are currently experiencing.

“In our own day,” the pope said, “the church offers to everyone the treasury of her social teaching in response to another Industrial Revolution and to developments in the field of artificial intelligence that pose new challenges for the defense of human dignity, justice and labor.”

In the aforementioned Encyclical Rerum Novarum, Pope Leo XIII criticized both the abuse of capitalism and the proposed solutions of socialists.

He argued that the Industrial Revolution caused much injustice, saying that “working men have been surrendered, isolated and helpless, to the hardheartedness of employers and the greed of unchecked competition.”

He additionally condemned “rapacious usury…practiced by covetous and grasping men,” saying that “a small number of very rich men have been able to lay upon the teeming masses of the laboring poor a yoke little better than that of slavery itself.”

Pope Leo XIII also condemned “the socialists,” however, whom he said were “working on the poor man’s envy of the rich,” sought to “destroy the structure of the home,” and were “striving against nature.”

Pope Francis on the Fourth Industrial Revolution

Pope Leo XIV is not the only pope to comment on the technological revolution of our time, often referred to as the “Fourth Industrial Revolution.”

His comments echo those made by the late Pope Francis, who addressed the issue on multiple occasions.

“The present moment offers the world a precious opportunity to guide and govern the transformations associated with the Fourth Industrial Revolution in a way that builds inclusive societies,” Pope Francis said in a 2016 message to the World Economic Forum (WEF). 

“However, it brings diminished opportunities for employment that also brings with it a responsibility among leaders to create jobs, tackle inequality and help solve society’s complex crisis,” the pope told the WEF, which has been a primary force in advocating for the acceleration of the Fourth Industrial Revolution, central to which is the merger of humanity and advanced artificial intelligence.

According to a short film on the Fourth Industrial Revolution created by the WEF, “the very idea of ‘human’ being some sort of natural concept is really gonna change. Our bodies will be so high tech, we won’t really be able to distinguish between what’s natural and what’s artificial.”