Pope Leo XIV on Thursday denounced what he described as the growing role of artificial intelligence in warfare, saying such investment and high-tech weapons risk driving conflicts into a “spiral of annihilation.” Speaking during a visit to Rome’s La Sapienza University, the pope called for peace in the Middle East and Ukraine and urged that education and research receive priority over expanding military budgets.
In his speech, Leo said how AI and advanced weaponry were being pursued was leading to a relationship between war and new technologies that he characterized as inhuman and accelerating. He cited multiple battlefronts, including Ukraine and Gaza and other areas in the Middle East, describing the current situation as illustrating that broader technological shift.
The pope also criticized what he said was a trend toward sharply higher military spending this year—particularly in Europe—at the expense of education and health care. He argued that the direction of spending and investment should change, saying education and research must move instead in the opposite direction, one that values life, and he said the lives of people who cry out for peace and justice must be treated as central.
Leo called for tighter monitoring of how AI is being developed and used in both military and civilian contexts. He said the goal should be to prevent AI from absolving humans of responsibility for the choices they make and from exacerbating the tragedy of conflicts.
Ahead of the speech, the pope received a warm welcome at Sapienza that included some of the university’s newest students. Those students were described as young Palestinians who arrived in Italy from Gaza this week on a “humanitarian corridor” arranged through the Italian government working with Catholic organizations.
Leo met some of the Gaza students during a brief greeting at the campus chapel and then again after his speech in the main lecture hall of the university. Sapienza dates to its founding by Pope Boniface VIII in 1303, and the remarks marked the first pope visit to the campus since Pope Benedict XVI had canceled a planned speech there in 2008 following protests from faculty and students.
Among the students who met Leo was Nada Rahim Jouda, 19, who had arrived in Italy just two days earlier. She said she was studying business science in Rome and described the city as “like heaven for me,” contrasting what she saw as green surroundings with “troubles everywhere and miserable people in the streets,” according to the account of her remarks.
Jouda said she remained concerned about family members she had left behind, including her mother, who was recovering from leukemia. She said that during the war in Gaza her family had been forced to move four times and that her mother had been unable to receive cancer care or check-ups.
Jouda said, “They all rely on me. I’m the only hope that they have.” Leo’s visit came as he is expected to explore AI-related themes further in his first encyclical, due to be released in the coming weeks, including the application of AI in everyday life and in warfare.
As MSI previously reported, Pope Leo XIV has also publicly pressed for peace and warned against escalation-related rhetoric connected to the conflict in the region—an emphasis that has continued into his latest remarks at Sapienza earlier.