In the Vatican’s translation of his speech, Pope Leo XIV shared that his name is a nod to Pope Leo XII, who led the church at the onset of the industrial revolution.

…I decided to adopt the name Leo XIV. There are several reasons for this, primarily because Pope Leo XIII in his landmark Encyclical Rerum Novarum tackled the social question during the first major industrial revolution. In contemporary times, the Church offers its vast tradition of social teaching to address another industrial revolution and the emergence of artificial intelligence, presenting new challenges for upholding human dignity, justice, and labor.

Below is more of the excerpt, published by the Catholic News Service.

The Catholic Church has taken a keen interest in the development of AI in recent years. In a January document published by the Vatican and translated to English, the church reflected on AI, its limitations, its relationship with the truth, and the ethics of developing and using the technology. The document also references a warning issued a year prior by Pope Francis about AI’s potential to create “partially or completely false narratives, believed and broadcast as if they were true.”

But if Pope Francis set up how the Catholic Church feels about AI, Pope Leo XIV citing it as a main reason for his name hints that it will be an even bigger part of the church’s focus during his papacy.