Pope Leo's Name Carries a Warning About the Rise of AI

Time​ Magazine

15-05-2025

New papal names often drip with meaning. Pope Francis, in 2013, named himself after Saint Francis of Assisi, signifying his dedication to poverty, humility, and peace. Pope Paul VI, in 1963, modeled himself after Paul the Apostle, becoming the first pope to make apostolic journeys to other continents.
When Robert Francis Prevost announced on Saturday he would take the name Leo XIV, he gave an unexpected reason for his choice: the rise of AI. The most recent Pope Leo, Prevost explained, served during the Industrial Revolution at the end of the 19th century, and railed against the new machine-driven economic systems turning workers into mere commodities. Now, with AI ushering in a 'new industrial revolution,' the 'defense of human dignity, justice and labor' is required, he said.
With his name choice and speech, Leo XIV firmly marks AI as a defining challenge facing our world today. But also embedded in the name is a potential path forward. Leo XIII, during his papacy, laid out a vision for protecting workers against tech-induced consolidation, including minimum wage laws and trade unions. His ideas soon gained influence and were implemented in government policies around the world.
While it's still unclear what specific guidance Leo XIV may issue on artificial intelligence, history suggests the implications of his crusade could be profound. If he mobilizes the world's one billion Catholics against AI's alienating potential as decisively as his namesake confronted industrial exploitation, Silicon Valley may soon face an unexpected and formidable spiritual counterweight.
'We have a tradition that views work from a theological perspective. It's not simply burdensome; it's where we develop ourselves,' says Joseph Capizzi, dean of theology and religious studies for The Catholic University of America. 'Pope Leo XIV is going to be drawing on our tradition to try to make a case for finding work that dignifies human beings—even while making space for AI to do things that human beings will no longer be doing.'
Rerum Novarum
At the heart of Leo XIV's new name choice is Leo XIII's formal letter Rerum Novarum, which he wrote in 1891. At the time, the Industrial Revolution was upending society. Mechanized production and factory systems generated unprecedented wealth and productivity, but led to the displacement of many agrarian jobs and people to move into overcrowded, unsanitary urban centers in search of work. The jobs there were grueling, unsafe, and paid terribly. The wealth gap widened dramatically, leading to massive social unrest and the rise of communist ideology.
In the midst of these many challenges, Leo penned Rerum Novarum, an encyclical that marked the first major example of a pope commenting on social justice. In it, Leo wrote that 'a small number of very rich men' had laid 'upon the teeming masses of the laboring poor a yoke little better than that of slavery itself.' There now existed as 'the gulf between vast wealth and sheer poverty,' he wrote.
To combat this trend, Leo explored potential solutions. First, he rejected communism, arguing that workers had a right to the fruits of their own labors. But he also stressed the need for a living wage, time for workers for family and church, and the right to form Christian trade unions. 'He was really championing the rights of workers,' says Dr. Richard Finn, director of the Las Casas Institute at Blackfriars, Oxford.
These ideas eventually caught hold. One of the first major advocates of minimum wage laws in the U.S. was the priest and economist John A. Ryan, who cited Pope Leo as a significant influence. Many ideas in his text 'A Living Wage and Distributive Justice' were later incorporated into the New Deal, when Ryan was an influential supporter of President Franklin D. Roosevelt. In the 1960s, the Catholic Church eventually came out in support of César Chávez and the United Farmworkers (UFW), which Chávez told TIME in 1966 was the 'single most important thing that has helped us.'
In Australia, Rerum Novarum influenced political leaders who forged a basic wage in that country. And in Mexico, the Rerum Novarum spurred the creation of many Catholic labor unions and mutual aid societies. 'It really shaped Catholic activism, with organizations working to ensure that Mexico was neither an unfettered capitalist country nor a Marxist state-owned state,' says Julia Young, a professor at the Catholic University of America. 'It was successful in creating Catholic associations that were very politically vocal.'
The Church and AI
More than a century after the industrial revolution, a similarly impactful technological revolution is unfolding, amidst many similar economic circumstances.
'In terms of similarities between now and then, there was rural to urban immigration changing the workplace, widespread exploitation of workers, and seemingly growing poverty in urban areas,' Young says. 'And so you had the church trying to respond to that and saying, 'We have a different response than Marx or the robber barons.'
While Leo XIV hasn't yet explicitly called for any of the same measures as Leo XIII, it is clear that he believes the rise of AI necessitates some sort of counterweight. And his citing of Rerum Novarum also perhaps reveals a hunger to provoke widespread social change and offer a third path in a two-power arms race. 'In our own day, the Church offers to everyone the treasury of her social teaching in response to another industrial revolution,' he said on Saturday.
Across the world, people are expressing intense anxiety about AI causing job displacement. (Some economists contend that these fears are overblown, however.) Like in the industrial revolution, the initial spoils of AI are flowing to a few ultra-powerful companies. And AI companies have also reinforced some of the worst aspects of predatory global capitalism systems: OpenAI, for instance, outsourced some of its most grueling AI training to Kenyan laborers earning less than $2 an hour.
Leo's interest in this area continues that of Pope Francis, who became increasingly vocal about the threats to humanity posed by AI in his later years. Last summer at the G7 Summit, he called for an international treaty to regulate AI, arguing that it could exacerbate social tensions, reinforce dominant cultures, and undermine education. 'We would condemn humanity to a future without hope if we took away people's ability to make decisions about themselves and their lives, by dooming them to depend on the choices of machines,' he said.
Some leaders have signaled the importance of prioritizing workers' rights during the AI revolution, like Senator Josh Hawley. But until a coherent political movement emerges, moral leadership on human dignity in the face of AI may flow from the church, and Pope Leo's outspoken leadership.
'He's saying AI is going to change the workplace—but it's got to change it in a way that fits with the dignity of employees,' says Dr. Finn.