In a closed-door meeting with clergy from the Diocese of Rome late last week, Pope Leo XIV clobbered his priests with a distinctly 21st-century request: to resist the “temptation to prepare homilies with artificial intelligence,” according to Vatican News.
“Like all the muscles in the body, if we do not use them, if we do not move them, they die,” the Pope reportedly said. “The brain needs to be used, so our intelligence must also be exercised a little so as not to lose this capacity.”
The holy father drew a fascinating line in the sand, declaring that despite AI’s capabilities now or in the future, a chatbot could never stand-in for a flesh-and-blood priest. “To give a homily is to share faith,” he said, and AI “will never be able to share faith.”
Aside from AI, the Pope warned his clergymen against conflating social media to real life, per Vatican News. If one lives a “life authentically rooted in the Lord,” they’re offering something special to the world, the Pope said, adding that a common “illusion on the internet, on TikTok” is to treat followers and likes as authentic spiritual connection.
Whether you follow the teachings of the church or not, the advice is a unique snapshot of the issues facing the Vatican in 2026. It also sits awkwardly with the Vatican’s own AI translation system, an upcoming program that will translate liturgical texts in up to 60 languages in real time.
That tool was announced the same day as the Pope’s meeting with clergy — though it could be viewed as a logical step in the centuries-long struggle to express biblical teachings in the common language of the people (a key criticism of one Martin Luther, if you want to get all historical.)
Either way, for an institution that’s weathered nearly two millennia of technological progress, the Vatican seems eager to define its line on AI.
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