The first papal encyclical in history dedicated to artificial intelligence was released today. An Anthropic co-founder was on stage at the Vatican to present it. Here is what that means for the way you and I build our businesses.
I was not expecting to write about the Vatican today.
I had my content plan. I had my calendar. And then I woke up to the news that Pope Leo XIV had released a document called Magnifica Humanitas, a full papal encyclical on the protection of the human person in the age of artificial intelligence, and that Christopher Olah, co-founder of Anthropic, the company that makes Claude, was standing on stage at the Vatican to present it.
I sat with that for a long time.
Because here is the thing: I spend most of my days teaching entrepreneurs how to use AI tools more effectively. How to build systems. How to save time. How to create content, close deals, and serve their clients better. The conversation I am in every single day is practical, tactical, and fast-moving.
And today, the most morally authoritative institution in the Western world stopped and said: wait. Before we talk about how fast this is moving, let us talk about where we are going and whether we are staying human on the way there.
The AI challenge, the document argues, is not technological. It is anthropological. It is a question of what it means to be human.
That is not the kind of sentence I expected to be writing about today. But I could not ignore it.
Key Takeaways
- Pope Leo XIV released Magnifica Humanitas on May 25, 2026, the first papal encyclical dedicated entirely to artificial intelligence and human dignity.
- The document argues the AI challenge is anthropological, not technological, and calls for a ban on lethal autonomous weapons without human oversight.
- Anthropic co-founder Christopher Olah was present at the Vatican presentation, signaling that AI’s builders are engaging with its deepest ethical questions.
- For entrepreneurs, this moment asks a practical question: are your customers experiencing your AI as a tool that serves their humanity, or as a system that replaces it?
- The entrepreneurs who will earn the deepest trust in the next decade are those who are asking the right questions, not just building the fastest products.
We Have Been Moving Fast Without Asking the Right Questions
Let me be honest about something.
I have spent the past several years genuinely excited about AI. Still am. I believe it is the most consequential tool for entrepreneurs that has ever existed. I have seen it transform businesses, free up time, and give solopreneurs capabilities they would never have had access to otherwise.
But I have also noticed something in the communities I am part of, including my own: the conversation is almost entirely tactical. What prompt works best? Which tool is faster? How do I automate this? How do I scale that?
We are building fast. And we are not always asking where we are building to.
Today’s encyclical names that tension in a way that no product launch, podcast episode, or newsletter has quite managed to name it. The document was signed on May 15 and formally released today. Its 245 paragraphs address not just AI weapons systems and labor displacement, but the fundamental question of what it means to build systems that simulate human faces and voices, that make consequential decisions, and that are controlled by a small number of powerful entities.
The Holy Father writes that technology is never neutral, because it takes on the characteristics of those who devise, finance, regulate, and use it.
That sentence should sit with every entrepreneur who builds with AI, teaches about AI, or sells AI-powered products.
What the Document Actually Says (and Why It Matters Beyond Religion)
I want to be clear about something: this post is not a theological argument. You do not have to share Pope Leo XIV’s faith tradition to take this document seriously.
Magnifica Humanitas draws on 130 years of Catholic social teaching, from Rerum Novarum in 1891 through Laudato Si, and applies those principles to AI. The secular translation of the core argument is this: any system that concentrates power, eliminates accountability, or treats human beings as data points rather than as people with dignity is a threat to the common good.
That is not a religious claim. It is a governance claim. And it is one that entrepreneurs building AI-powered businesses should care about deeply.
Here are the specific elements of the document that I think every AI-focused entrepreneur needs to understand.
First, the document calls explicitly for a ban on lethal autonomous weapons, meaning systems that make life-and-death decisions without meaningful human oversight. The principle here is not limited to warfare. It is the principle that any consequential, irreversible decision should have a human being who is accountable for it. That principle applies to your business too, if you are using AI to make hiring decisions, pricing decisions, or communications that significantly affect your customers.
Second, Magnifica Humanitas addresses the concentration of AI power in the hands of a few companies. It calls these arrangements a new form of epistemic, economic, and political asymmetry. For entrepreneurs, this is not an abstract concern. The platforms you build on are controlled by a very small number of companies. The document asks whether that concentration serves the common good, or whether it creates new forms of dependency and vulnerability.
Third, the encyclical rejects posthumanism, the idea that the line between human and machine should blur or be eliminated. It also critiques transhumanism, the belief that technology should help humans overcome biological limitations. These positions have direct implications for how entrepreneurs design AI-powered products. Are we building tools that extend human capability, or are we building replacements for human judgment and relationship?
And here is what is remarkable about today: Christopher Olah, one of the co-founders of Anthropic, was on stage at the Vatican for the presentation. Olah’s specific area of research is AI interpretability, which is the field dedicated to understanding what is actually happening inside AI models. The fact that he was there is not incidental. It is a signal that even the people building the most powerful AI systems in the world are taking these questions seriously in public, formal, and accountable ways.
A 2025 survey by the Pew Research Center found that 72% of Americans believe AI companies are not doing enough to ensure their technologies benefit society. Magnifica Humanitas is responding to a real and widespread anxiety, not a fringe concern.
What Thoughtful Entrepreneurs Do With This
Here is where I want to land, because this is not a post designed to make you feel guilty about using AI. I use it every day. I teach it. I believe in it.
What I am suggesting is that today is a useful moment to ask a harder question than “how do I use this more efficiently?”
The question is: what is my customers’ experience of my AI?
Not what does my AI do. What does my customer experience when they interact with my AI-powered product, content, or service? Do they feel like a person being served by a thoughtful tool? Or do they feel like a data point being processed by a system?
That distinction is the practical application of everything in the encyclical.
There are three things I believe entrepreneurs can do immediately that align with the principles in Magnifica Humanitas, not because the Pope says so, but because they are genuinely good business practice.
The first is to add human accountability to your consequential AI decisions. If your AI is making recommendations that significantly affect your customers, make sure a human being reviews those recommendations. Document who is accountable. This is not just an ethical principle. It is a liability principle and a trust principle.
The second is to be honest about what your AI is doing. If a piece of content was AI-assisted, say so. If your email sequence is automated, be transparent. The encyclical’s concern about AI simulating human faces and voices is pointing at a real trust problem: when people discover they were deceived, they do not just lose trust in the individual. They lose trust in the category.
The third is to build for human flourishing, not just human efficiency. The tools that will earn the deepest loyalty over the next decade are not the ones that are fastest. They are the ones that leave the customer feeling more capable, more understood, and more human after the interaction than before it.
Practical Steps
Step 1: Do an AI accountability audit. Identify every place in your business where AI is making or influencing a consequential decision. For each one, write down who is accountable for reviewing and approving that output before it reaches a customer.
Step 2: Write your AI usage statement. Draft a plain-language paragraph explaining how you use AI in your business. What it does. What it does not do. What human oversight exists. Make it public. Even if no one reads it today, writing it forces clarity about your own practices.
Step 3: Ask the “staying human” question. For each AI touchpoint in your business, ask: does this leave my customer feeling more human or less human? More seen or more processed? This is not a technical question. It is a relationship question.
Step 4: Add one human moment to your most automated sequence. If you have an email sequence, a nurture flow, or an onboarding experience that is fully automated, identify one place to insert a genuine human moment. A personal voice note. A direct message. A live call invite. Not because automation is wrong, but because the contrast makes the human moment more valuable.
Step 5: Engage the question publicly. Write one post, record one video, or host one community conversation about how you think about AI and human dignity in your business. You do not have to have all the answers. The act of asking the question publicly is a trust signal that no AI can replicate.
Frequently Asked Questions
Does this encyclical mean the Catholic Church is against AI?
No. Magnifica Humanitas explicitly supports AI that serves human flourishing. The document critiques AI that eliminates accountability, concentrates power unfairly, or replaces human judgment in irreversible decisions. The position is that AI should be a tool for human dignity, not a replacement for it.
Why should a non-religious entrepreneur care about a papal encyclical?
Because the arguments in the document are not theological arguments. They are governance, ethics, and accountability arguments that apply to any business using AI at scale. The concerns about data concentration, autonomous decision-making, and human dignity are concerns that regulators, customers, and employees are raising regardless of religious context.
What does it mean for my business if I am using AI to create content?
Transparency and authentic human presence become your most important differentiators. The document’s critique of AI simulating human voices and faces points at a real trust risk. If your customers ever discover they were deceived about whether content was human or AI-generated, the trust damage will be significant.
How should I think about the “human oversight” principle for a small business?
For most entrepreneurs, human oversight means reviewing AI outputs before they go to customers for anything consequential: proposals, contracts, personalized advice, or communications that affect a customer’s important decisions. It does not mean reviewing every automated email. It means having a human accountable for the systems you are running.
Is this a sign that AI regulation is coming for small businesses?
The broader regulatory direction is clearly toward more accountability, transparency, and human oversight requirements for AI systems. While enforcement will initially focus on large companies, the principles being established now will eventually apply to anyone selling AI-powered products or services. Building those practices in early is not just ethical. It is strategic.
What I Believe About All of This
I have built my business around the belief that AI, in the hands of people who use it with integrity, is one of the most powerful forces for human flourishing that has ever existed.
I still believe that.
What today reminded me is that using AI with integrity requires actually thinking about integrity, not just assuming that because my intentions are good, the systems I am building are serving people well.
The Vatican entering this conversation is not a setback for AI. It is a signal that the conversation has reached the level of moral seriousness it deserves.
You do not have to agree with every position in Magnifica Humanitas. I do not agree with all of them myself.
But here is what I know: the entrepreneurs who will earn the deepest trust over the next decade are not the ones who moved fastest. They are the ones who moved thoughtfully. The ones whose customers could see that the person building these tools was actually thinking about them, not just about efficiency metrics and conversion rates.
That is the business case for taking today seriously.
Jonathan Mast is an AI educator and entrepreneur who serves 40,000+ entrepreneurs through White Beard Strategies and the AI Prompts for Entrepreneurs community. He is the creator of the Perfect Prompt Framework and the author of “The AI-First Entrepreneur.” A father and man of faith, Jonathan brings a human-centered perspective to AI adoption that has made him one of the most trusted voices in practical AI education for business owners.
