AI, Pope Leo XIV: “Great opportunities, but we must protect humanity”

Vatican City (Vatican), September 29 (LaPresse) – “Preserving human voices and faces” is the theme chosen by Pope Leo XIV for the 60th World Communications Day. The Pontiff chose to focus the day on the topic of artificial intelligence, starting with the vast possibilities of communication today and emphasizing that modern tools must be at the service of humanity. In today’s communication ecosystems, technology influences interactions in ways never before possible—from algorithms that select content in news feeds to artificial intelligence that edits entire texts and conversations. Humanity now has capabilities unimaginable just a few years ago. But while these tools offer efficiency and far-reaching reach, they cannot replace the uniquely human capacities for empathy, ethics, and moral responsibility. Public communication requires human judgment, not just data patterns. The challenge is to ensure that humanity remains the guiding agent. The future of communication must ensure that machines are tools that serve and connect human life, not forces that erode the human voice. We have great opportunities. At the same time, the risks are real. Artificial intelligence can generate engaging but misleading, manipulative, and harmful content, replicate biases and stereotypes present in training data, and amplify misinformation by simulating human voices and faces.