Pope Leo and the Next ‘Industrial Revolution'

The Atlantic

8 hours ago

The pope didn't take long to explain why he picked the name Leo. Two days after his election, he cited his inspiration: the preceding Pope Leo, who led the Church while the West confronted the social and economic disruptions of the Industrial Revolution. The world now faces 'another industrial revolution,' Leo XIV said last month, spurred not by mechanized manufacturing but by artificial intelligence. In particular, he noted the challenges that AI poses to 'human dignity, justice, and labor,' three concerns that his 19th-century namesake prioritized as he responded to the technological transformations of his time.
In 1891, Leo XIII published Rerum Novarum, a moral and intellectual framework that addressed the growing inequality, materialism, and exploitation ushered in by the Industrial Revolution. The current pope has signaled that AI's arrival demands a similar intervention; if the earlier Leo's tenure is any indication, it could be the most ambitious and enduring project of Leo XIV's papacy. Rerum Novarum will be a guiding influence.
Leo XIII insisted in Rerum Novarum that labor is both 'personal' and 'necessary' for each individual, and that societies should protect the dignity of their workers as they pursue economic growth. Idolizing capital widens inequality, hence the 'misery and wretchedness' that many employers inflicted on much of the working class during the Industrial Revolution. The pope stated that socialism was no solution, but that employers must guarantee their workers reasonable hours, just wages, safe workplaces, and the right to unionize.
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These statements by the Church gave crucial backing to workers' movements and civic organizations fighting for labor protections. In Europe, Rerum Novarum consolidated Catholic support for workers and bolstered the political influence of labor unions, many of which adopted Christian principles to advance their cause. Leo XIII's interventions played a significant role in the United States as well. The pope supported American worker movements such as the Knights of Labor, and inspired Catholic reformers including Monsignor John Ryan, whose advocacy for a universal living wage influenced architects of the New Deal. Leo XIII also commissioned the likes of Saint Frances Cabrini and Saint Katharine Drexel to expand their missionary work, ultimately seeding hospitals, schools, orphanages, and public-housing complexes that addressed injustices faced particularly by immigrants, Black Americans, and Native Americans.
Rerum Novarum also had a profound influence on the Catholic Church itself. The document inaugurated what's now known as modern Catholic social teaching, an expansive intellectual tradition that emphasizes the common good, social justice, human dignity, and concern for the poor.
Now Leo XIV has an opportunity to update this tradition for the age of AI. Like his namesake, he could marshal the Church's intellectual, cultural, and institutional resources, helping build a moral consensus about how to use a new technology that threatens to degrade humanity rather than serve it. Vice President J. D. Vance recently conceded that America is not equipped to provide this kind of leadership, but that the Catholic Church is.
Leo has plenty of material to work with. Earlier this year, two administrative bodies within the Vatican produced an advisory document called Antiqua et Nova, which uses the Catholic intellectual tradition to argue that AI cannot engage with the world as a human can. For one thing, no technology has the capacity 'to savor what is true, good, and beautiful,' the authors write. Lacking interiority and a conscience, AI cannot authentically grasp meaning, assume moral accountability, or form relationships. As a result, the document contends, developers and users must take responsibility for AI products, ensuring that they don't exacerbate inequality, impose unsustainable environmental costs, or make decisions in war that could result in the indiscriminate loss of life.
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Both of us have contributed to initiatives that seek to better understand AI in the context of Catholic social teaching. Mariele is a member of an AI research group within the Vatican that recently published a book, Encountering Artificial Intelligence, that considers the ethical impacts of AI in politics, education, the family, and other spheres of life. In health care, for example, AI can help improve access to certain kinds of assessment and treatment, but it can also perpetuate disparities through biases reflected in data, or disrupt the relationship between patients and health-care professionals. We are both part of a cohort at the University of Southern California investigating the ethical and social implications of transhumanism, especially as it intersects with AI. The group consists mostly of theologians and Catholic bioethicists, but we have found that many scholars working outside the Catholic tradition are eager to engage with the Church's thinking on these issues. Encouraging such collaboration will be crucial for Leo.
As was true of the technology of the Industrial Revolution, AI will become most dangerous when economies prioritize profit and technological development over human flourishing and the dignity of labor. Left unregulated, markets will continually choose efficiency at the expense of workers, risking widespread unemployment and the dehumanization of the kinds of work that manage to survive. If the social order does not put technology at the service of people, markets will put the latter at the service of the former.
Although the Church may not have the same influence in the secular 21st century that it did in the 19th, there are signs of a possible Catholic resurgence —particularly among young people—that could help Leo reach a wider audience. Just as it did during the first Industrial Revolution, the Church has a chance to help safeguard work that is dignified, justly paid, and commensurate with human flourishing. The pope's new name is a hopeful sign that this responsibility won't go unmet.