Pope Leo XIV to launch AI encyclical with Anthropic

Pope Leo XIV is set to launch his first encyclical on Monday with Anthropic co-founder Chris Olah, as the Vatican warns about AI technology promoted “at the expense of human dignity.” The timing lands amid a fraught U.S. backdrop for Anthropic—after the compan

When Pope Leo XIV steps to the window overlooking St. Peter’s Square for his next message, the point isn’t just religious. It’s aimed straight at the machines now shaping daily life.

The pope will address the world on Monday to launch his first encyclical, a papal letter sent to all bishops in the Catholic Church. He will do it alongside a co-founder of Anthropic—Chris Olah—and a collection of religious leaders and theologians.

The Vatican’s push is already framed as a defense of people, not technology. In a speech last May. just days after being elected. Leo described the rise of AI as “another industrial revolution. ” saying that new developments “pose new challenges for the defense of human dignity. justice and labor.” At a Vatican conference on AI on Friday. he returned to the same warning. pointing to the “unbridled promotion and implementation of technology at the expense of human dignity. ” and to “the damage caused when chatbots and other technologies exploit our need for human relationships.”.

The pope’s stance has drawn at least some pushback among American conservatives—though the more immediate flashpoint is the company he is now bringing into the Vatican’s spotlight. Olah. who will speak at the encyclical presentation. wrote last week on X that “the questions posed by AI are bigger than the AI community.” He said the world—“religions. civil society. academics. governments”—needs to participate in creating a “positive outcome.”.

Anthropic has positioned itself as an AI company focused on risk mitigation. with its chatbot Claude at the center of its public identity. But its relationship with the U.S. government has been troubled. In February, Anthropic refused the Defense Department’s demands to remove safety precautions on its technology. The specific targets included mass surveillance of U.S. citizens and autonomous weapons. The day after that refusal, President Donald Trump ordered federal agencies to stop using Anthropic’s products.

That clash has not erased Anthropic’s ambition. Last fall. the company paid $1.5 billion to settle a copyright infringement lawsuit. compensating authors $3. 000 for each of the 500. 000 estimated books it was accused of training its AI technology on. In February, Anthropic said it was valued at $380 billion, placing it as a direct rival to Sam Altman’s OpenAI.

Seen together, the Vatican’s language and the company’s record create a sharp tension that neither side can afford to ignore: a moral appeal aimed at AI’s human costs, delivered with a leading industry figure from a company that has already been pulled into a U.S. national-security fight.

There is also an added layer of concern about how this gets perceived. The relationship between the Vatican and Anthropic poses risks of “laundering” the AI company’s image with religious and moral leaders—especially as the public debate over AI has become increasingly heated.

And the Vatican isn’t entering this argument from scratch. A Friday report in Religion News Service says AI companies have been speaking with the Vatican about ethics since as far back as 2016. including with tech leaders such as former Google CEO Eric Schmidt. who University of Arizona students booed multiple times when he drew comparisons between the rise of AI and the beneficial impact of the first computers.

Back in the U.S., the politics around AI are moving beneath the surface as well. Massive investment in AI companies is continuing at a rapid pace despite its unpopularity among the public. Most Americans. as tracked across recent months. don’t want data centers in their area. believe AI does more harm than good in their day-to-day lives. and expect broad adoption to shrink the number of available jobs.

Whether Pope Leo XIV’s first encyclical will shift any of those realities remains to be seen. But it is not the first time a papal letter has been thrust into a world argument at high speed. Pope Francis used a 2015 encyclical on climate change to call for action to prevent the “unprecedented destruction of the ecosystem. ” warning that the planet was starting to “look more and more like an immense pile of filth.”.

For Pope Leo XIV, Monday’s launch will be another test of whether moral language can reach the technology—before it hardens into policy, commerce, and, for millions of people, habit.

Pope Leo XIV AI encyclical Anthropic Chris Olah Donald Trump U.S. Department of Defense federal agencies mass surveillance autonomous weapons Claude copyright lawsuit Vatican AI conference human dignity human relationships technology ethics