AI and the Homily: A Critical Examination of Pope Leo XIV’s Recent Remarks

The recent remarks of Pope Leo XIV urging priests “to resist the temptation to prepare homilies with artificial intelligence” merit careful and extended analysis. His concerns touch on the nature of preaching, the exercise of the intellect, the authenticity of pastoral communication, and the place of technological mediation in ecclesial life. Because the Pope is correct on several foundational points, it is all the more important to examine where his conclusions do not follow and where his diagnosis of artificial intelligence rests on conceptual misunderstandings.