ENZO BIANCHI AND THE DEATH OF CAMILLO RUINI: PLEASE PRAY IN FRONT OF A DECEASED, THE ACCOUNTS ARE NOT SETTLED

«Even the card. Ruini is dead! A clergyman who caused many in the church to suffer. She gave the face of her stepmother to the church, the face of the church seeking authority, influence and seat among the powerful. But he did not have approval from the card. Martini nor by Pope Francis" (Enzo Bianchi).

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When the Church accompanies one of its children to death he does not convene a historic tribunal, it does not open a political debate and does not proceed with an ideological verification of the life of the deceased.

The Church does something much simpler e, at the same time, infinitely deeper: pray. He does so because he looks at death in the light of the victory of the risen Christ, according to the proclamation of the Apostle: «Death was swallowed up for victory. Where, death, your victory? Where, death, your sting?» (1 Color 15,54-55). For this reason, the general premises of the Funeral Rite remind us that the deceased remains a brother in the faith and that the entire ecclesial community gathers around him to accompany him with prayer, offering the Eucharistic sacrifice and raising suffrages. In fact, the Church prays for the deceased because it believes that corporal death does not interrupt their belonging to Christ and that, for this, the prayer of the Church can still benefit them.

It is from this faith that we must start when looking at the death of a Christian, not first of all by the role he held in the Church, from the battles he fought or from the judgments that history will formulate on his person and his work. All this belongs to legitimate historical judgment and can be discussed and even severely criticized. In the face of death, But, the Church looks first of all at the baptized person. It is not without significance that, in the official verification of the death of the Roman Pontiff, he who bore that pontifical name for years was called three times by his baptismal name: in the face of death, in a sense, everyone returns to the origin. This is why the first word of the Church is not judgement, but prayer, because the deceased is first and foremost a child of the Church entrusted to the mercy of God and accompanied by the intercession of his brothers.

It is in the light of this faith that what happened after the death of Cardinal Camillo Ruini must be considered. It is not of interest here to establish whether he was right or wrong in the great ecclesial battles of recent decades, nor discuss the historical judgment on his vision of the Church. The question is another and concerns the reaction aroused by his disappearance, because precisely at the moment in which the Church entrusts one of her children to the mercy of God and accompanies him with prayer, the Christian is called to measure his words and his judgments with the very meaning of Christian death.

They were not missed, in the hours following his death attempts to read this figure almost exclusively through political and ideological categories. The Daily, the 16 June 2026, published the article by Francesco Antonio Grana: «Cardinal Camillo Ruini has died. Interference in politics, proximity to the right, the relationship with Berlusconi: history of the Italian Richelieu»; The Manifesto was titled «Ruini, religion as a political instrument". Certainly legitimate readings on a historical and journalistic level, but which show how easy it is to continue discussing a person in terms of sides, influence and power even at the moment of his death. And so, in this same vein, a few hours after the death of Cardinal Camillo Ruini, Enzo Bianchi intervened on his X profile by writing:

«Even the card. Ruini is dead! A clergyman who caused many in the church to suffer. She gave the face of her stepmother to the church, the face of the church seeking authority, influence and seat among the powerful. But he did not have approval from the card. Martini nor by Pope Francis".

The question that emerges from those words it concerns Cardinal Ruini much less than it concerns Enzo Bianchi himself: which conception of Christian death manifests who, in front of a deceased person, first of all he feels the need to reopen an ecclesial controversy? It is a question that does not arise from controversy, but by the faith of the Church. A militant atheist who continues his polemic in front of a dead person acts according to the logic he professes, although he often avoids doing so because he shows the respect for death that some Christians do not have. Instead, by Enzo Bianchi, who for decades spoke of evangelical spirituality and eccentric monastic life, becoming a celebrity disputed by Italian bishops who competed to invite him to hold conferences in their cathedrals during the years of Cardinal Camillo Ruini's long presidency of the CEI, one would expect at least the elementary memory of what the Church does in front of a deceased person.

In this context the spiritual testament of Camillo Ruini takes on a meaning that goes far beyond the personal story of its author. Anyone expecting self-defense from a protagonist of Italian ecclesial life will be surprised, because those pages do not contain claims or attempts to justify their historical choices. What emerges instead is the confession of one's own insufficiencies, the request for forgiveness and the invocation of divine mercy. He acknowledges that he has sometimes acted harshly, he asks for forgiveness, confesses the smallness of his faith and presents himself simply as a man called to appear before God. This is where the contrast becomes evident. On the one hand there is a man who has reached the end of his life and entrusts himself to divine mercy; on the other who, in the face of that death, feels the urgency of reopening the accounting of ecclesial controversies. Which of the two is looking at death in a Christian way: Camillo Ruini or Enzo Bianchi?

Even more so it is not a question of establishing who was right in the controversies that have crossed the Italian Church in the last forty years. It is not a question of deciding whether this Cardinal was a great ecclesial protagonist or a questionable protagonist. Nor is it a question of denying Enzo Bianchi the right to radically disagree with his vision, but to understand what happens when a Christian dies. Because there is a substantial difference between historical judgment and the polemical use of death: the first is legitimate; the second instead reveals a loss of the Christian meaning of death. When a man's coffin becomes the latest battlefield of a decades-long ecclesiastical war, when the body of a deceased is used as polemical material and the death of a brother in the faith becomes an opportunity to settle scores that have remained open, It's not just the respect due to the dead that is damaged: the very faith in God's judgment is called into question, in mercy, in the communion of saints and in eternal life. Because of this, in the end, the problem is not Cardinal Camillo Ruini. The problem is us. Because if faced with the death of a Christian we no longer know how to pray, if faced with a spiritual testament imbued with a request for forgiveness and mercy we only know how to reopen old processes, if we continue to think like faction militants at the very moment in which the Church invites us to pray for a deceased brother, then we have not simply lost our sense of proportion, but something essential about the Christian faith has been lost. When this happens, prophecy gives way to controversy, which ends up imposing itself even in the face of death.

It must be said that Cardinal Camillo Ruini, nicknamed “Cardinal Thin”, he did not fail to write in his will:

«When Pope Francis was elected I rejoiced and, as much as I could, I was immediately a supporter of his. Even today I rejoice and thank him for his extraordinary evangelizing enthusiasm. However, I must confess that I find myself in an uncomfortable situation, certainly not for personal reasons but because I struggle to understand some orientations that seem to me to reopen wounds, after the Council they were barely medicated. I humbly ask the Lord to convince me internally that the Church is his and that he himself takes care of it, beyond our human sights".

This is not the place to address issues that would require other spaces. However, it remains difficult not to observe that many of the most serious contemporary ecclesial problems have their roots in the long and complex pontificate of John Paul II, of which Camillo Ruini was one of the most influential figures, arriving gangrenous at the pontificate of Benedict XVI - under which he continued his mandate as President of the CEI and Vicar General of the Diocese of Rome for another two years - and in certain respects out of control during the complex pontificate of Francis, everything to be understood before even being studied in the face of a very difficult situation inherited by him from the two previous pontificates, which he tried to cope with in situations that were very difficult to manage. It is therefore striking to read in his will the confession of the difficulty in understanding some ecclesial orientations specific to Francis' pontificate. If the profound meaning of these events was not fully clear to him during his earthly life, it is reasonable to think that today, coming face to face with God, understand it with a fullness that remains closed to those who, like us living people, look at history from within its inevitable partiality.

Florence, 22 June 2026

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WHY CARAVAGGIO YES AND RUPNIK NO?

If the value of a work depends on the morality of its author, then we will have to empty churches, museums and art galleries across the West

- Actuality -

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For some years now hosts of candid souls have formed who demand that the works of Jesuit Marko Ivan Rupnik be removed from churches, sanctuaries and places of worship. There is no shortage of professional indignants, the permanently scandalized and the vestal virgins who, after suddenly discovering the existence of sins against the Sixth Commandment, they call for the cancellation of the mosaics created by the former Slovenian Jesuit.

The fiercest accusers of this artist they are precisely those subjects who, a page before or two pages later, state and explain that certain rainbow-coloured ecclesiastics cannot be questioned for their life conduct, because certain vices and habits would be part of their private life.

An inevitable question then arises: the execrable sexual conduct attributed to Marko Ivan Rupnik perhaps took place in St. Peter's Square during the Sunday Angelus recitation, or they also belonged to his private life? Because, if private life is invoked as a reason to remove some subjects from any public judgment, it is difficult to understand why the same criterion should be suddenly abandoned when the subject in question is Marko Ivan Rupnik.

The accusation according to which the artist would have had a moral conduct incompatible with the presence of his works in sacred buildings, in fact it introduces a criterion so eccentric as to be impracticable when tested by facts. If applied with a minimum of consistency, it would in fact force us to empty not only part of the history of Christian art, but a considerable part of the history of Western art, especially the sacred one. Yet this very criterion is today proposed with increasing insistence. It is not simply asked that any personal responsibilities be ascertained by the competent ecclesiastical authorities, something different is expected: that the work is dragged into the same process as the man who created it; that the moral judgment on the author automatically transforms into condemnation of the work; what mosaics, frescoes, paintings and sculptures are evaluated not for what they represent, but for the private biography of those who created them.

The question, therefore, It's no longer just about Marko Ivan Rupnik. It concerns a much broader principle. Because if the artistic and spiritual value of a work must be measured on the basis of the moral conduct of its author, then we need to have the courage to apply this criterion to the entire history of art and not just to the artist who, for media or ideological reasons, has become the target of the moment.

Already in December of 2022, when the case had taken on international dimensions, Vicar General of His Holiness for the diocese of Rome, Cardinal Angelo De Donatis, recalled that Father Marko Ivan Rupnik had provided the Church of Rome with "numerous and precious ministerial services" and that his artistic activity had left a visible mark in ecclesial places of primary importance. At the same time he expressed dismay at the matter and assured full collaboration with the competent authorities. Two statements that are not mutually exclusive and that, indeed they should be kept together. One thing is to ascertain any personal responsibilities, another is the judgment on the artistic work produced by a person (cf.. Diocese of Rome, Statements by Cardinal Angelo De Donatis on the Rupnik case, 19 December 2022, who).

At this point the question becomes inevitable: we are really willing to apply to the history of art the criterion according to which the work must be condemned together with the man who created it? Because, if this is the path we intend to take, we will have to be consistent all the way. And then the problem will no longer concern only Marko Ivan Rupnik.

Let's start with Michelangelo Merisi known as Caravaggio. Extraordinary painter, author of some of the greatest masterpieces of sacred art, he was at the same time a violent man, involved in constant fights and legal affairs, until he killed Ranuccio Tomassoni in 1606 and to be formally condemned to death by the justice of the Papal State. Yet no one proposes removing the Vocation of Saint Matthew from the churches, the Conversion of Saint Paul, the Deposition, the Martyrdom of Saint Lucia and so on. Evidently the value of the work is not judged on the basis of its author's criminal record.

Let's move on to Benvenuto Cellini, sculptor, brilliant goldsmith and artist. The chronicles of his time and his own autobiography tell of murders, violence, fights and trials for sodomy. Even in this case no one has ever thought of eliminating his works from museums or erasing his name from the history of art.

We continue with Giovanni Antonio Bazzi, went down in history with the nickname of Sodom, which was not attributed to him out of distraction or gratuitous slander. Yet his frescoes, filled with clearly homoerotic scenes in Renaissance style, continue to be admired in churches and monasteries without anyone calling for campaigns to remove or cancel series of frescoes from monastic cloisters.

We then come to Gian Lorenzo Bernini, the greatest artist of the Roman Baroque. When he discovered the relationship between his brother and Costanza Bonarelli, of whom he was a lover, he reacted with such violence that one of his servants slashed the woman's face in revenge. This did not prevent his works from continuing to adorn basilicas, squares and churches, without anyone ever thinking of demolishing the Ecstasy of Saint Teresa or the Baldachin of Saint Peter.

We could go on and on. But the point is already clear: for centuries Christian and Western civilization has distinguished the moral judgment on man from the artistic judgment on the work. Today, instead, someone claims to introduce a new criterion according to which the artist's sin should automatically contaminate what he has created. Except support, when the protagonists are others, that no one should be interested in their lifestyle because they belong to that private sphere which, apparently, it remains inviolable for some and becomes a criterion of public condemnation for others.

Florence, 14 June 2026

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WHY CARAVAGGIO YES AND RUPNIK NO?

If the value of a work of art depends upon the morality of its creator, then we shall have to empty churches, museums and art galleries throughout much of the Western world

— Actuality —

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For several years now, whole ranks of pure souls have been demanding that the works of the Jesuit Marko Ivan Rupnik be removed from churches, shrines and places of worship. There is no shortage of professional moralists, perpetual scandal-seekers and modern vestal virgins who, having suddenly discovered the existence of sin, call for the removal of the mosaics created by the former Slovenian Jesuit (cf. here). The most relentless accusers of this artist are often the very same people who, one page earlier or two pages later, explain that certain rainbow-coloured churchmen should not be criticised for their conduct because such vices and habits belong to their private lives (cf. here).

An inevitable question therefore arises: were the sexual acts attributed to Marko Ivan Rupnik carried out in Saint Peter’s Square during the Sunday Angelus, or did they also belong to his private life? For if private life is invoked as a reason for shielding certain individuals from public scrutiny, it becomes difficult to understand why the same principle should suddenly be abandoned when the person concerned is Marko Ivan Rupnik.

The accusation that the artist’s alleged moral conduct is incompatible with the presence of his works in sacred buildings introduces a criterion so eccentric as to prove unworkable when tested against historical reality. Applied with even a minimum degree of consistency, it would require us to empty not only a significant part of Christian art, but a considerable portion of Western art as a whole, especially sacred art. Yet this is precisely the criterion that is being proposed with increasing insistence today. What is being demanded is not simply that any personal responsibilities be investigated by the competent ecclesiastical authorities. Something far more radical is being proposed: that the work of art be dragged into the same trial as the man who created it; that moral judgement upon the artist automatically become a condemnation of the work itself; that mosaics, frescoes, paintings and sculptures be evaluated not according to what they represent, but according to the private biography of their creator.

The issue, therefore, no longer concerns Marko Ivan Rupnik alone. It concerns a much broader principle. For if the artistic and spiritual value of a work must be measured according to the moral conduct of its creator, then one must have the courage to apply the same criterion to the whole history of art and not merely to the artist who, for media or ideological reasons, has become the latest target of public condemnation.

As early as December 2022, when the case had already assumed international dimensions, Cardinal Angelo De Donatis, Vicar General of His Holiness for the Diocese of Rome, recalled that Father Marko Ivan Rupnik had rendered «numerous and valuable ministerial services» to the Church of Rome and that his artistic activity had left a visible mark upon ecclesiastical sites of primary importance. At the same time, he expressed deep concern over the affair and assured full cooperation with the competent authorities. These are two statements that do not exclude one another and which, indeed, ought to be held together. One thing is the investigation of any personal responsibilities; quite another is the judgement to be passed on the artistic work produced by a person (cf. Diocese of Rome, Statement of Cardinal Angelo De Donatis regarding the Rupnik case, 19 December 2022, here).

At this point the question becomes unavoidable: are we truly prepared to apply to the whole history of art the principle that a work must be condemned together with the man who created it? For if this is the road we intend to take, then we must be consistent to the very end. And in that case the problem will no longer concern Marko Ivan Rupnik alone.

Let us begin, then, with Michelangelo Merisi, known as Caravaggio. An extraordinary painter and the creator of some of the greatest masterpieces of sacred art, he was at the same time a violent man, constantly involved in brawls and legal troubles, eventually killing Ranuccio Tomassoni in 1606 and being sentenced to death by the courts of the Papal States. Yet no one proposes removing from churches The Calling of Saint Matthew, The Conversion of Saint Paul, The Entombment, or The Burial of Saint Lucy. Evidently, the value of the work is not judged on the basis of the criminal record of its creator.

Let us move on to Benvenuto Cellini, sculptor, goldsmith and artistic genius. The chronicles of his age and his own autobiography recount murders, acts of violence, brawls and trials for sodomy. Yet no one has ever suggested removing his works from museums or erasing his name from the history of art.

We may continue with Giovanni Antonio Bazzi, who entered history under the nickname of Sodoma, a name that was certainly not bestowed upon him by accident, still less through gratuitous slander. Nevertheless, his frescoes, permeated with unmistakably homoerotic Renaissance imagery, continue to be admired in churches and monasteries without anyone calling for campaigns of removal or for entire cycles of frescoes to be erased from monastic cloisters.

Then there is Gian Lorenzo Bernini, the greatest artist of the Roman Baroque. Upon discovering the relationship between his brother and Costanza Bonarelli, with whom he himself was involved, he reacted with such violence that he had the woman’s face slashed by one of his servants in an act of revenge. Yet this has not prevented his works from continuing to adorn basilicas, churches and public squares, nor has anyone ever suggested demolishing the Ecstasy of Saint Teresa or the Baldachin of Saint Peter’s Basilica.

We could continue at length. Yet the point is already clear enough: for centuries Christian and Western civilisation distinguished between moral judgement upon the individual and artistic judgement upon the work. Today, by contrast, some seek to introduce a new criterion according to which the artist’s sin should automatically contaminate whatever he has created.

This principle, however, is not applied consistently. For the very same people who demand that works of art be judged according to the moral conduct of their creators are often the first to insist, when confronted with the conduct of others, that such matters belong exclusively to the sphere of private life and should therefore be of no concern to anyone else.

The question, then, remains unanswered: why should one principle apply to Marko Ivan Rupnik and another to everyone else? If the value of a work of art truly depends upon the moral perfection of its creator, then consistency would require us to remove from churches, monasteries, museums and galleries a considerable part of the artistic heritage of the Christian West. If, on the other hand, we recognise that the value of a work cannot simply be reduced to the virtues or vices of its author, then we must admit that the issue extends far beyond the case of Marko Ivan Rupnik.

For this reason the debate is not really about one artist. It is about whether we wish to preserve a civilisation capable of distinguishing between the moral failings of a human being and the objective value of what that human being has created.

From Florence, 14 June 2026

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WHY CARAVAGGIO YES AND RUPNIK NO?

If the value of a work of art depends on the morality of its author, then we will have to empty the churches, the museums and art galleries of much of the West

— Current Events —

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For some years now True legions of candid souls have formed who demand that the works of the Jesuit Marko Ivan Rupnik be removed from churches, shrines and places of worship (cf. here). There is no shortage of those who are indignant by profession, the permanently scandalized and the vestal virgins who, after suddenly discovering the existence of sins against the Sixth Commandment, They call for the elimination of the mosaics made by the former Slovenian Jesuit. The fiercest accusers of this artist are precisely those who, one page before or two pages after, They affirm and explain that certain rainbow-hued ecclesiastics should not be questioned for their way of life, because certain vices and customs would be part of their private sphere (cf. here).

An inevitable question then arises.: Did the execrable sexual behavior attributed to Marko Ivan Rupnik take place in St. Peter's Square during the Sunday Angelus prayer?, or they also belonged to his private life? Why, if private life is invoked as a reason to remove certain people from all criticism, It is difficult to understand why this criterion should be abandoned when the person in question is Marko Ivan Rupnik.

The accusation according to which the artist would have maintained a moral conduct incompatible with the presence of his works in sacred buildings introduces, indeed, a criterion so eccentric that it is impracticable when confronted with the reality of the facts. This criterion, Applied with a minimum of consistency, would force not only to empty a part of the history of Christian art, but also considerably from the history of Western art, and in particular sacred art. Y, however, Precisely this criterion is today proposed with increasing insistence. It is not simply requested that possible personal responsibilities be clarified by the competent ecclesiastical authorities; something very different is intended: that the work be dragged into the same process as the man who made it. That the moral judgment on the author automatically becomes a condemnation of the work; what mosaics, frescos, paintings and sculptures are valued not for what they represent, but for the private biography of the one who created them.

The question, therefore, It no longer concerns only Marko Ivan Rupnik. It refers to a much broader principle. Because if the artistic and spiritual value of a work must be measured on the basis of the moral conduct of its author, then it is necessary to have the courage to apply this criterion to the entire history of art and not only to the artist who, for media or ideological reasons, has become the target of the moment.

Already in December 2022, when the case had acquired international dimensions, the Vicar General of His Holiness for the Diocese of Rome, Cardinal Angelo De Donatis, He recalled that Father Marko Ivan Rupnik had provided the Church of Rome with "numerous and valuable services of a ministerial nature" and that his artistic activity had left a visible mark in ecclesiastical places of primary importance.. At the same time, expressed its dismay at the events and assured full collaboration with the competent authorities. They are two statements that are not mutually exclusive and that, on the contrary, they should stick together. One thing is the clarification of possible personal responsibilities; It is quite another to judge the artistic work produced by a person. (cf. Diocese of Rome, Statements by Cardinal Angelo De Donatis on the Rupnik case, 19 December 2022, here).

At this point, the question becomes inevitable: Are we really willing to apply to the history of art the criterion according to which the work must be condemned along with the man who made it?? Why, If that is the path we intend to take, we will have to be consistent until the last consequences. And then the problem would no longer affect only Marko Ivan Rupnik.

Let's start with Michelangelo Merisi, known as Caravaggio. Extraordinary painter, author of some of the greatest masterpieces of sacred art, who was at the same time a violent man, continually involved in fights and legal proceedings, to the point of killing Ranuccio Tomassoni in 1606 and be formally sentenced to death by the justice of the Papal States. Y, however, no one proposes removing the vocation of Saint Matthew from the churches, The conversion of Saint Paul, The descent of Christ, The burial of Saint Lucia and many other works. Evidently, The value of a work is not judged based on the criminal record of its author.

Let us now turn to Benvenuto Cellini, sculptor, brilliant goldsmith and artist. The chronicles of his time and his own autobiography recount homicides, acts of violence, fights and trials for sodomy. Nor in this case has anyone ever thought about removing his works from museums or erasing his name from art history..

Prosigamos with Giovanni Antonio Bazzi, gone down in history with the nickname of Sodom, which was not attributed to him either through carelessness or gratuitous slander. However, its fresh, impregnated with openly homoerotic scenes in a Renaissance key, They continue to be admired in churches and monasteries without anyone calling for withdrawal campaigns or the elimination of entire cycles of frescoes from monastic cloisters..

Let us now come to Gian Lorenzo Bernini, the greatest figure of the Roman Baroque. When he discovered the relationship between his brother and Costanza Bonarelli, of whom he was a lover, He reacted with such violence that he ordered one of his servants to disfigure the woman's face out of revenge.. This has not prevented his works from continuing to adorn basilicas., squares and churches, without anyone having ever thought of demolishing the Ecstasy of Saint Teresa or the Baldachin of Saint Peter.

We could continue like this for a long time. But the point is already made clear: for centuries, Christian and Western civilization distinguished between moral judgment on man and artistic judgment on the work. Hoy, instead, Some seek to introduce a new criterion according to which the artist's sin should also automatically contaminate what he has created.. Except hold, when the protagonists are others, that no one should be interested in their life behaviors because they belong to that private sphere that, apparently, remains inviolable for some and becomes a criterion of public condemnation for others.

Florence, 14 June 2026

.

.

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Dear Readers,
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Or if you prefer you can use our
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Editions The island of Patmos

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For international bank transfers:
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«MY MOTHER MUST NOT KNOW». WHERE THE RESPONSIBILITY OF THE POPES IS BORN AND DIES

If the Pontiff has not been informed, who did not inform him? If he was misinformed, who misinformed him? And if he was even deceived, who deceived him? What is striking, in the examination of quite a few cases, is that these figures almost always remain nameless, faceless and without precise identification.

- Church news -

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PDF print format article – article print format – article in printed format

 

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In the exercise of government in general, perhaps in the pastoral one of the Church in particular, the principle according to which the king cannot make mistakes applies and, if he were to make a mistake, someone else has to pay for him. This principle tends to protect not so much the person himself, as the institution that it is called upon to cover or, in the case of the papacy, to embody (cf.. Mt 16, 18-19).

To stay in the political sphere and represent everything with an effective example: according to the article 89 of the Constitution of the Italian Republic, all acts of the Head of State are countersigned, as politically irresponsible. The countersignature in fact transfers the political and legal responsibility for the act from the President of the Republic to the proposing ministers or to the Government, while guaranteeing the formal regularity of the measure.

If we move from the political sphere to the spiritual one instead we discover something substantially different: while the Head of State of the Italian Republic, like other Heads of State governed by different but similar constitutional systems, Republican president or monarch, is not responsible for political acts carried out in the exercise of its functions, even though he could be called to answer for serious crimes against the State, the Roman Pontiff is not judged by any human authority (cf.. Code of Canon Law, can. 1404: The first seat is judged by no one). His supreme power, milk, immediate and universal on the Church (cf.. can. 331) in fact he knows no superior earthly authority.

but yet, despite these immunities created to protect the office, of the Petrine ministry and his apostolic succession, the Roman Pontiff, unlike any other political figure, republican or monarchic, remains fully responsible for its own actions, of their own words, of one's works and omissions on a spiritual and moral level before God and before the Church. In fact, he enjoys total human legal immunity, but precisely for this reason his moral responsibility is not attenuated, quite the opposite: if anything it is increased by the singularity of his office and the absence of any superior earthly authority called to judge him. This regardless of the fact that, if necessary, someone may be exposed, sacrificed or called to pay in his place. In fact, these are dynamics attributable to government policy, sometimes even its most unscrupulous forms, which, however, have no relevance on a doctrinal level, ecclesiological or metaphysical. Before God there are no ministerial countersignatures, nor responsibilities transferable to others.

Over the last few decades However, that period has progressively established itself which I have already had the opportunity to define as the era of uninformed and kept in the dark Pontiffs.. In these cases, not even the ancient scapegoat sacrificed to save the sovereign who cannot make mistakes or be exposed for his own mistakes no longer pays.. Responsibility rather tends to dissolve in a generic lack of information, in news that would not have reached its destination, in filtered alerts, incomplete or even altered by others. And that this could happen occasionally is entirely plausible. No man, not even the Roman Pontiff, possesses the gift of omniscience. However, less plausible appears to be the fact that this explanation recurs with surprising regularity under different pontificates, in different eras and in profoundly different events. In fact, it is at this point that an inevitable question arises: if the Pontiff has not been informed, who did not inform him? If he was misinformed, who misinformed him? And if he was even deceived, who deceived him? What is striking, in the examination of quite a few cases, is that these figures almost always remain nameless, faceless and without precise identification.

Here's an example. Let's assume that within the micro-state of which the Roman Pontiff is sovereign, blatant and serious violations of human rights occur, even as he is particularly active on the international scene in calling out governments, supranational institutions and bodies to respect the dignity of the person and the protection of fundamental rights. It is in cases like these that various justifying mechanisms tend to be activated: we are talking about information that was not received, of news filtered along the way, of incomplete relationships, of collaborators who would not have reported, of apparatuses that would have shielded reality and so on. All subjects almost always shrouded in vagueness, nameless, of face and precise identity.

Vladimir Putin governs a federation that spans over seventeen million square kilometers and spans eleven time zones. Donald Trump presides over a federation that spans nearly ten million square kilometers and spans six time zones. Both, wanting, they could argue with some reasonableness that they are not able to know everything that happens in the most remote points of their territories, of the various central administrations and above all of the peripheral ones. The same argument can also be invoked by the Supreme Pontiff, sovereign of a state that extends for just over half a square kilometre? A state in which, to go from the Apostolic Palace to the Vatican Gardens, it is not necessary to face an intercontinental flight, cross deserts, mountain ranges or tropical forests, nor even change the time on the clock to adapt to different time zones. However, also in this case, it may happen that certain news stories undertake such long journeys, tortuous and bumpy that they will never be able to reach their final destination.

The distance between the Vatican City State and Gaza is considerable. However, this does not prevent - rightly - from raising our voices in defense of the tormented Palestinian people, as well as other peoples deprived of their rights in even more distant lands. It may be, however, that this constant and necessary reminder of human rights violations committed thousands of kilometers away sometimes makes it more difficult to deal with the different Gazas and their respective tortured Palestinians who may find themselves right inside the sacred palaces of that half square kilometer.

It is perhaps due to the lack of information? Can be. It's because of filtered news, withheld or never reached their destination? It could be this too. Anything can be. As it can be, to quote the late and unforgettable Giuni Russo: «My mother must not know that I want to go to Alghero in the company of a foreigner» (cf.. who).

One thing, however, remains out of question on a doctrinal and juridical level: the Roman Pontiff is not judged by any human authority. But perhaps precisely for this reason he is called to answer in a particular way before God for his own thoughts, of their own words, of one's works and omissions, without anyone being able to countersign his documents to relieve him of responsibility or assume responsibility, if necessary, political responsibility in his place. Because if the sovereign can be protected by men, the question always remains open of how he will be judged by Him who knows perfectly what men have seen, what they did not see and even what they preferred not to see. It is written:

"To whom much is given, much will be asked for; to whom men have committed much, It will ask the more " (LC 12, 48).

And before the divine tribunal it will be very difficult to say you don't know, that they were not informed or were deceived in half a square kilometre.

From the island of Patmos, 7 June 2026

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«MY MOTHER MUST NOT KNOW». WHERE THE RESPONSIBILITY OF PONTIFFS IS BORN AND WHERE IT DIES

If the Pontiff was not informed, who failed to inform him? If he was misinformed, who misinformed him? And if he was actually deceived, who deceived him? What is striking, upon examining not a few cases, is that such figures almost always remain without a name, without a face and without any precise identification.

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In the exercise of government in general, and perhaps in that of the Church’s pastoral governance in particular, there operates a principle according to which the king cannot be wrong and, should he happen to err, someone else must pay in his place. This principle is intended to protect not so much the person himself as the institution he is called to occupy or, in the case of the papacy, to embody (cf. Mt 16, 18-19).

To remain within the political sphere and illustrate the matter with an effective example: according to Article 89 of the Constitution of the Italian Republic, all acts of the Head of State must be countersigned, since he is politically irresponsible. The countersignature transfers the political and legal responsibility for the act from the President of the Republic to the proposing ministers or to the Government, while at the same time guaranteeing the formal validity of the measure.

If we move from the political sphere to the spiritual one, we discover something substantially different: whereas the Head of State of the Italian Republic, like other Heads of State governed by different but analogous constitutional systems, whether republican president or monarch, is not accountable for political acts performed in the exercise of his office, although he may be called to answer for grave crimes against the State, the Roman Pontiff is judged by no human authority (cf. Code of Canon Lawi, can. 1404: The first seat is judged by no one). His supreme, full, immediate and universal power over the Church recognises no higher earthly authority (cf. can. 331).

Yet, despite these immunities established for the protection of the office, the Petrine ministry and its apostolic succession, the Roman Pontiff, unlike any other political figure, whether republican or monarchical, remains fully responsible for his acts, his words, his deeds and his omissions on the spiritual and moral plane before God and before the Church. He indeed enjoys complete juridical immunity before men, but precisely for this reason his moral responsibility is not diminished; quite the contrary: it is heightened by the singularity of his office and by the absence of any superior earthly authority called to judge him. This remains true regardless of the fact that, when circumstances require it, someone else may be exposed, sacrificed or called upon to pay in his place. Such dynamics belong to the sphere of governmental politics, at times even in its more ruthless forms, yet they possess no relevance whatsoever on the doctrinal, ecclesiological or metaphysical plane. Before God there are no ministerial countersignatures, nor responsibilities transferable to others.

During the past decades, however, there has gradually emerged what I once described as the era of Pontiffs who are uninformed and kept in the dark. In such cases, not even the ancient scapegoat sacrificed in order to save the sovereign who cannot err or be exposed for his own mistakes is called upon to pay. Responsibility tends instead to dissolve into a generic lack of information, into reports that allegedly never reached their destination, into notices filtered, incomplete or even altered by others. That such things may occasionally occur is entirely plausible. No man, not even the Roman Pontiff, possesses the gift of omniscience. Less plausible, however, is the fact that this explanation recurs with surprising regularity under different pontificates, in different periods and in circumstances profoundly unlike one another. It is at this point that an inevitable question arises: if the Pontiff was not informed, who failed to inform him? If he was misinformed, who misinformed him? And if he was actually deceived, who deceived him? What is striking, upon examining not a few cases, is that such figures almost always remain without a name, without a face and without any precise identification.

Let us take an example. Let us suppose that within the micro-State over which the Roman Pontiff is sovereign there occur manifest and serious violations of human rights, precisely while he is particularly active on the international stage in calling governments, institutions and supranational bodies to respect human dignity and safeguard fundamental rights. It is in cases such as these that various justificatory mechanisms are promptly set in motion: one hears of information that never arrived, of reports filtered along the way, of incomplete briefings, of collaborators who allegedly failed to report matters, of bureaucratic structures that supposedly screened reality from view, and so forth. All subjects almost invariably enveloped in vagueness and deprived of any clear name or identity.

Vladimir Putin governs a federation extending across more than seventeen million square kilometres and spanning eleven time zones. Donald Trump presides over a federation extending across nearly ten million square kilometres and spanning six time zones. Both, if they wished, could reasonably maintain that they are unable to know everything that takes place in the most remote corners of their territories, within the various central administrations and, above all, within the peripheral ones. May the same argument also be invoked by the Supreme Pontiff, sovereign of a State extending over little more than half a square kilometre? A State in which, in order to pass from the Apostolic Palace to the Vatican Gardens, there is no need to undertake an intercontinental flight, cross deserts, mountain ranges or tropical forests, nor even to adjust one’s watch to different time zones. Yet even in such a case it may happen that certain pieces of information undertake journeys so long, tortuous and hazardous that they never succeed in reaching their final destination.

The distance between the Vatican City State and Gaza is considerable. Yet this does not prevent the Holy See – rightly so – from raising its voice in defence of the long-suffering Palestinian people, just as it does for other peoples deprived of their rights in lands even more distant. It may be, however, that this constant and entirely justified concern for human rights violations committed thousands of kilometres away sometimes makes it more difficult to come to terms with the various Gazas and their respective suffering Palestinians who may be found within the sacred palaces of that half square kilometre.

Is it perhaps the fault of a lack of information? It may be. Is it the fault of reports filtered, withheld or never delivered to their destination? That too may be the case. Anything is possible. Just as it may be, to borrow the words of the late and unforgettable Giuni Russo: «My mother must not know that I want to go to Alghero in the company of a foreigner» (cf. here).

One thing, however, remains beyond dispute on both the doctrinal and juridical levels: the Roman Pontiff is judged by no human authority. Yet perhaps precisely for this reason he is called in a particular way to answer before God for his thoughts, his words, his deeds and his omissions, without anyone being able to countersign his acts in order to relieve him of responsibility or assume political responsibility in his stead. For if the sovereign may be protected by men, there remains the question of how he will be judged by Him who knows perfectly what men have seen, what they have not seen and even what they have preferred not to see. For it is written: «Everyone to whom much was given, of him much will be required; and from him to whom they entrusted much, they will demand the more» (Page 12:48).

And, quite frankly, before the divine tribunal it will be very difficult to claim not to have known, not to have been informed, or to have been deceived within half a square kilometre.

From The Island of Patmos, 7 June 2026

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«MY MOTHER SHOULD NOT KNOW». WHERE IS BORN AND WHERE DOES THE RESPONSIBILITY OF THE PONTIFFS DIE??

If the Pontiff was not informed, Who stopped reporting it?? If you were misinformed, who misreported it? And if he was even deceived, who deceived him? What attracts attention, when examining many cases, is that such figures almost always remain nameless, faceless and without precise identification.

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In the exercise of government in general, and perhaps particularly in the pastoral government of the Church, governs the principle according to which the king cannot make a mistake and, if I were to make a mistake, someone else must pay instead. This principle tends to protect not so much the person themselves as the institution they are called to occupy or, in the case of the papacy, to embody (cf. Mt 16, 18-19).

To remain in the political sphere and represent all this with an effective example: according to the article 89 of the Constitution of the Italian Republic, all acts of the Head of State must be endorsed, because this is politically irresponsible. The endorsement transfers the political and legal responsibility for the act from the President of the Republic to the proposing ministers or the Government., while guaranteeing the formal regularity of the act.

If we move from the political sphere to the spiritual we discovered something substantially different: while the Head of State of the Italian Republic, like other Heads of State governed by different but analogous constitutional systems, whether president of a republic or monarch, is not responsible for political acts carried out in the exercise of its functions, although he may be called to answer for serious crimes against the State, The Roman Pontiff cannot be judged by any human authority (cf. Code of Canon Law, can. 1404: The first seat is judged by no one). Indeed, his supreme power, full, immediate and universal over the Church recognizes no higher earthly authority (cf. can. 331).

However, despite these immunities established for the protection of the office, of the Petrine ministry and his apostolic succession, the Roman Pontiff, unlike any other political figure, republican or monarchical, remains fully responsible for his actions, of his words, of their works and their omissions on the spiritual and moral level before God and before the Church. He certainly enjoys total legal immunity from men., but precisely for this reason his moral responsibility is not diminished; quite the opposite, It is increased by the singularity of his profession and by the absence of any higher earthly authority called to judge him.. This is true regardless of whether, if necessary, someone can be exposed, sacrificed or called to pay in his place. These are dynamics inherent to government policy., sometimes even in its most ruthless forms, but which lack any relevance at the doctrinal level, ecclesiological or metaphysical. Before God there are no ministerial endorsements or responsibilities transferable to others..

During the last decades that stage that I already had the opportunity to define as the era of the Pontiffs who were not informed and kept in the dark has progressively been affirmed.. In these cases, not even the former scapegoat sacrificed to save the sovereign who cannot make mistakes or be exposed for his own errors no longer pays.. Rather, responsibility tends to dissolve in a general lack of information, in news that supposedly never reached its destination, in leaked ads, incomplete or even altered by others. That this can happen occasionally is entirely plausible.. no man, not even the Roman Pontiff, possesses the gift of omniscience. It is less plausible, however, the fact that this explanation reappears with surprising regularity under different pontificates, in different times and in profoundly different circumstances. It is precisely at this point that an inevitable question arises.: if the Pontiff was not informed, who failed to inform you? If you were misinformed, who misreported it? And if he was even deceived, who deceived him? What attracts attention, when examining many cases, is that such figures almost always remain nameless, faceless and without precise identification.

Let's take an example. Suppose that within the microstate of which the Roman Pontiff is sovereign, serious and clear violations of human rights occur., precisely while he is particularly active in international politics urging governments, supranational institutions and organizations to respect the dignity of the person and the protection of fundamental rights. In cases like these, when various justification mechanisms are usually activated from time to time,: we talk about information not received, leaked news, of incomplete reports, of collaborators who supposedly did not report, of bureaucratic structures that would have hidden the truth and so on. Subjects, almost always, wrapped in vagueness, without precise name and identity.

Vladimir Putin governs a federation that spans more than seventeen million square kilometers and spans eleven time zones. Donald Trump presides over a federation that spans nearly ten million square kilometers and crosses six time zones.. Both, if they wanted it that way, could maintain with reasonable grounds that they are not in a position to know everything that happens in the most remote corners of their territories, of the various central administrations and, above all, of the peripheral. Can the same argument be invoked in the case of the Supreme Pontiff, sovereign of a State that extends for just over half a square kilometer? A state in which, to go from the Apostolic Palace to the Vatican Gardens, it is not necessary to take an intercontinental flight, cross deserts, mountain ranges or tropical jungles, much less modify the clock time to adapt to different time zones. And even in this case, It may happen that certain news undertake such long journeys, tortuous and bumpy roads that never reach their final destination.

The distance between Vatican City State and Gaza is considerable. However, This does not prevent – ​​and rightly so – from raising our voices in defense of the tortured Palestinian people., as well as other peoples deprived of their rights in even more distant lands. It can happen, nevertheless, that this constant and justified attention to human rights violations committed thousands of kilometers away sometimes makes it more difficult to confront the various Gaza and the respective tortured Palestinians who can be found precisely within the sacred palaces of that half a square kilometer.

Is it perhaps the fault of the lack of information? Could be. ¿It's the fault of leaked news, held or never reached their destination? It can also be. everything can be. In the same way it can be, to say it in the words of the unforgettable Giuni Russo: «My mother must not know that I want to go to Alghero in the company of a foreigner» (cf. here).

One thing, however, remains beyond discussion at the doctrinal and legal level: The Roman Pontiff cannot be judged by any human authority. But perhaps precisely for this reason he is called to respond in a particular way before God for his thoughts., his words, his works and his omissions, without anyone being able to endorse his actions to exempt him from responsibility or assume, if necessary, political responsibility in place. Because if the sovereign can be protected by men, The question always remains open as to how he will be judged by Him who knows perfectly what men have seen., what they have not seen or even what they have not preferred to see. Well it is written: «To whom much was given, a lot will be required of him; and to whom much was entrusted, "even more will be asked of him" (LC 12,48).

Y, sincerely, before the divine court It will be very difficult to say that you did not know, that they had not been informed or that they had been deceived in half a square kilometer.

From the Island of Patmos, 7 June 2026

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GREAT HUMANITY. NOT A METAPHYSICS OF ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE: LEO XIV AND THE CUSTODY OF MAN

The problem is not how powerful Artificial Intelligence becomes, but which man uses it. Because no technique perfects what does not exist and for this reason, what is missing in man, it cannot be delegated to the machine to be created […] Civilizations begin to decline when they stop distinguishing between what can be built and what must be preserved. And of all the things man can lose, the most difficult to reconstruct is always the same: freedom.

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Read the first encyclical of a Pontiff a year after the beginning of his pontificate it is always a delicate exercise, if the topic then touches on one of the most complex and controversial elements of our time: Artificial Intelligence.

The risk is twofold: on the one hand, demanding from the text what it does not want to be, on the other hand, attribute to him what he doesn't say. This methodological clarification is necessary from the beginning, Why Magnificent Humanity it was not born as a technological manifesto nor as a philosophical treatise on the nature of Artificial Intelligence. Perhaps it is precisely from here that a first impression of disorientation arises in the theologian accustomed to the great speculative encyclicals of the twentieth century.. Indeed, who expected a document built on the model of The human race, Of Development of Peoples, Of Centennial year o di Faith and Reason he might be surprised. The rest, in the magisterium of the Roman Pontiffs at least two great varieties of documents can be distinguished: texts that speak above all to the present, to the ecclesial community, to society, to politics and the urgencies of their time; texts that inevitably become dated over the years and whose main value no longer consists in offering direct answers to the problems of the present, but in allowing certain passages to be understood, crises and evolutions in the life of the Church. An example among many could be You will be surprised, given by Gregory XVI in 1832, whose sociopolitical conceptions cannot be extrapolated from that precise historical context and transposed into contemporary society. Then there are documents that, even though they were also born within a specific historical season, they mainly address issues that touch on the permanent foundations of faith and Christian anthropology and therefore continue to speak beyond their own time; think about it, with different characteristics, at the The splendor of truth of John Paul II or to Spe salvi by Benedict XVI. It is naturally still early to establish which of the two genres it belongs to Magnificent Humanity, but a first impression is that Leo XIV chose to speak to the historical present, offering orientation criteria for a transformation already underway, rather than elaborating a synthesis intended to constitute a long-term theological reference.

Leo XIV does not address the problem wondering if machines can really think, nor does it enter into the distinction between intelligence, consciousness and computation. This is perhaps a structural limit? More than a limit it seems to be the choice of a different path, outlined from the first pages: read technological transformation as a question that concerns first and foremost the vocation of man, his way of inhabiting the world and ordering his own action. From this perspective, the center of the encyclical does not appear to be Artificial Intelligence as an autonomous object of analysis, but the human subject who develops and uses it. This orientation emerges with particular clarity in chapter VI (cf.. NN. 95-99), where the August Author recalls the risk that technical efficiency is taken as the prevailing criterion for the organization of human action and insists on the fact that progress is inseparable from the formation of conscience, by personal responsibility and man's ability to direct means towards authentically human ends. Hence the insistence of the document not so much on the limits of the machine, as well as on the quality of the person who uses it. This choice also emerges in the symbolic structure of the text. In fact, the encyclical opens its reasoning through two biblical images that the Holy Father uses as a key to understanding the entire document (cf.. chapter I, NN. 8-12). The first is the story of Babel (cf.. Gen 11,1-9): men decide to build a city and a tower "whose top reaches the sky" to affirm their self-sufficiency and "make a name for themselves"; the result is not greater unity, but the confusion of languages ​​and dispersion. The second image is that of the reconstruction of Jerusalem led by Nehemiah (cf.. Born 2-6): a destroyed city is rebuilt not to exalt someone's power, but through an orderly work, shared and oriented towards the possibility for a people to return to live and live. Through these two images the document does not contrast the technical with the non-technical, but two spiritually opposite forms of building: on the one hand the work that arises from man's self-sufficiency, from the claim to dominate the sky and from the uniformity that sacrifices the person to efficiency; on the other, patient reconstruction, shared and ordered to God, in which the common good does not arise from the power but from the responsibility of a people who mend the bonds even before the walls.

However, one question remains open which will inevitably accompany the reading of the entire text: the custody of the person and the reminder of responsibility will be sufficient to address a phenomenon that does not only concern the use of new tools, but the progressive transfer to technical apparatuses of acts that belong to knowing, to judging and deliberating proper to the person?

I. CONTINUITY AND DISCONTINUITY: THE PROBLEM IS NOT THE TECHNIQUE, BUT THE POINT FROM WHICH YOU LOOK AT IT

One of the first questions that the reader inevitably asks himself when faced with this encyclical is whether we find ourselves in continuity with the great magisterium of the twentieth century or before a document that, despite placing themselves in the same ecclesial groove, it belongs to a different level of theological construction, cultural and qualitative. The answer cannot be univocal: in terms of its fundamental contents, the text clearly fits into the continuity of the Social Doctrine of the Church. However, this does not oblige us to maintain that we are faced with a document of the same speculative depth, of the same processing capacity or the same qualitative level that characterized some great encyclicals of the last century. Recognizing this difference does not mean formulating a negative judgment on the magisterium of Leo, own sensitivity and priorities - but take note that not all magisterial documents are constructed with the same degree of speculative elaboration nor do they possess the same ability to generate theological categories destined to have a stable impact on the cultural and historical level.

Already in the introduction Leo XIV recalls the task entrusted to each generation of giving shape to its own time while safeguarding the dignity of the person, promoting justice and making brotherhood possible, reiterating that the permanent risk is that of building an inhuman world precisely at the moment in which man's ability to transform reality increases. The continuity with the previous social teaching is evident, however the observation point chosen by the text appears different. Pius XII developed his teaching through a strong work of conceptual clarification: distinguished the levels of discourse, it delimited categories and tended to build argumentative architectures in which each concept occupied a specific place. An approach supported mainly by constant comparison with the great theological tradition of the Church - from the Fathers to the Doctors - and by the classical metaphysical framework, especially in its scholastic elaboration, assumed as an instrument to safeguard the order between nature and grace, reason and faith, history and truth. Paul VI tended to read the great historical processes - economic development, social transformations, relations between peoples, modernization — trying to understand its consequences on man, on his dignity, on his freedom and on the forms of human coexistence. More than delimiting concepts, he was trying to build a vision capable of holding history together, society, personal development and vocation. John Paul II addressed the issues of his time by constantly bringing them back to the question of man. Its broad categories — person, truth, freedom, work, body, consciousness — were not presented as isolated themes, but as elements of a unitary vision in which man is understood as a moral subject called to truth and responsibility. For this reason its documents are not normally limited to indicating practical guidelines, but they tend to construct a true interpretation of man and history. Leo. A choice that emerges clearly above all in the way in which the document defines the task of discernment: not understanding how far the technique can go, but to establish towards which ends it should be oriented. An important shift ensues: the problem is not placed primarily on the level of efficiency, but on the level of human judgment. The question that remains open is not whether machines can become more intelligent, but if the man, progressively delegating acts that belong to his personal experience, still maintains control over his actions or ends up adapting to the logic of the tools he has built. For this reason the encyclical insists less on the nature of the instrument and more on the responsibility of the person who uses it. This orientation emerges with particular clarity in chapter V (cf.. n. 87), where Leo XIV states that the decisive criterion does not consist in the development of technical capacity as such, but in the question about the subject that governs it and the end to which it is ordered. So that, the decisive question, that's not what machines can do, but what man chooses to become through what he himself builds. In this sense, the document recalls that technological development cannot be evaluated exclusively on the basis of efficiency or increase in operational capabilities, but it must be judged in light of the consequences it produces on the person and on social life. The text insists that no innovation can be considered beneficial simply because it is possible or effective, but must be subjected to discernment on the human good that it is called to serve (cf.. chapter III, NN. 60-64).

However, one question remains open which will inevitably accompany the subsequent debate: whether the call to safeguard the human is sufficient or whether it becomes necessary to also question the way in which technologies modify the concrete exercise of judgment, of freedom and conscience. Therefore, whether this encyclical will have the merit of seriously reopening this question, he will have already accomplished something important.

(II). ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE: GUARDING MAN OR UNDERSTANDING WHAT HE IS BECOMING?

It is probably on this point that one of the most characteristic nuclei of the encyclical is concentrated. Leo XIV does not address Artificial Intelligence starting from the question of the nature of intelligence or the possibility that artificial processes reproduce human thought. In chapter III (cf.. NN. 52-58) the document refers rather to risk than technique, as an ordered instrument for human action, progressively tends to transform into an environment capable of influencing perception, relationships and forms of experience. Subsequently, in chapter IV (cf.. NN. 71-76), addressing the issue of delegation of decision-making functions, the encyclical insists on the fact that no technical apparatus can replace personal responsibility and moral judgment. From here emerges the central point of the text: the decisive question is not what the machine can become, but what man risks to stop exercising. For this reason the document does not focus its interest on the technical description of Artificial Intelligence systems, but he repeatedly returns to the question of the human subject who designs and uses them. This orientation emerges in chapter II (cf.. NN. 28-32), where the Supreme Pontiff recalls the criterion of the dignity of the person as a measure of progress; in chapter IV (cf.. NN. 79-82), where he insists on the responsibility that accompanies every technological decision; and in chapter VI (cf.. NN. 112-116), where the common good is indicated as a criterion for judging the effects of digital transformations on social life. From this perspective, the problem is not placed primarily on the level of machine performance, but on the relationship between technical development and human responsibility.

The implicit question of the encyclical therefore seems to be: how to avoid man being reduced to a function of the system he himself has built? It is a serious and necessary question. However, right here a possible limit also emerges, or maybe, more correctly, a deliberate choice. Because the text does not seem to want to fully address an issue that today appears increasingly decisive: not just what man should guard, but what man is becoming.

The revolution of Artificial Intelligence in fact, it does not only concern new tools. It touches how we perceive time, we exercise judgment, we build relationships, we understand the body, we live freedom and form conscience. From this point of view, the problem is not simply preventing the machine from replacing man; the problem is understanding whether man, progressively entrusting increasingly larger parts of one's experience to external devices, you risk changing the very way of being a man. The encyclical approaches this question in chapter VI (cf.. NN. 103-108), when it recalls the danger of a progressive reduction of human experience to what can be measured, technically processed and administered, insisting on the fact that the person never coincides with the sum of his functions nor with the processes he is able to delegate. However, the document does not continue this line of reflection to the point of a systematic anthropological elaboration and does not enter extensively into the question of how technologies affect the structure of the cognitive act., of judgment and deliberation. His main interest remains moral and social. For this reason, the most fruitful contribution that the text can offer to the ecclesial debate does not consist so much in having said the last word on Artificial Intelligence, as in having remembered which one should remain the first: the human person. In this sense, the reference contained in chapter VII acquires particular importance (cf.. n. 124), where Leo XIV states that authentic progress does not coincide with the increase in operational capacity, but with the growth of man in responsibility and communion, remembering that no technical advancement can replace the individual's own value.

III. A FIRST CONCLUSION: BETWEEN THE CUSTODY OF MAN AND FREEDOM DENIED

It would be ungenerous to read this encyclical asking it for what it did not intend to offer. Magnificent Humanity choose another path: don't start from the question of what technique is, but by the question of which man is formed by the use of technology. We are faced with a text that chooses a different path: call the Church and the world to safeguard man in the time of digital transformation. A further question remains open - and perhaps will have to be addressed in the coming years: whether protecting man only means protecting his dignity or also understanding more deeply what is happening to his intelligence, to his freedom and his experience of reality. If this encyclical will have the merit of seriously reopening this question, he will have already accomplished something important.

Reading this encyclical I couldn't avoid a comparison with some reflections that I developed in my recent book Freedom denied (Editions The island of Patmos, January 2026), dedicated to the relationship between freedom, ethics, Artificial Intelligence and Christian anthropology. It is not a question of superimposing a personal work on the magisterium of the Roman Pontiff - but by nature, purpose and authority belongs to a completely different order - but to put two different points of observation into dialogue when faced with the same question. The encyclical chooses to address the topic starting from the Social Doctrine of the Church. This orientation emerges in particular in chapter II (cf.. NN. 28-32), where Leo. In my book I instead chose a different starting point: question the relationship between technique and the human act of knowing, judge and decide, developing this reflection in the light of the classical theological tradition and in particular the thought of Saint Thomas Aquinas. The decisive point was not whether the machine can become more efficient than man, but to ask ourselves whether there are acts specific to the person that cannot be delegated without altering the human itself. From this perspective I have taken up one of the central intuitions of the Thomistic synthesis: moral discernment arises from the unity between ratio e understanding, between the ability to analyze and that of grasping truth in its unity. Judgment does not coincide with calculation. And it is precisely here that the Thomistic principle takes on a decisive meaning. In my book I took up the famous axiom: «Grace does not destroy nature, but finish (Grace does not destroy nature, but he perfects it, QUESTION, I, I, 8 ad 2)». This principle does not state that grace replaces what man lacks; states the opposite: it brings a real nature to fruition, without eliminating or replacing it. Applied analogically to the relationship between man and Artificial Intelligence, the principle leads to a radical question: if grace perfects nature but does not replace it, can technique perfect faculties that man does not possess? The answer I have tried to develop is negative: Artificial Intelligence can amplify existing capabilities, speed up processes, support complex operations; but it cannot generate what is missing: it does not produce consciousness where there is no consciousness, it does not generate judgment where there is no moral formation, it does not create discernment where interiority is lacking.

The problem is not how powerful Artificial Intelligence becomes, but which man uses it. Because no technique perfects what does not exist and for this reason, what is missing in man, it cannot be delegated to the machine to be created. In the book I dedicated to this topic I explain that no civilization has ever collapsed because it had too powerful tools. Civilizations begin to decline when they stop distinguishing between what can be built and what must be preserved. And of all the things man can lose, the most difficult to reconstruct is always the same: freedom.

Rome, 25 May 2026

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GREAT HUMANITY. NOT A METAPHYSICS OF ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE: LEO XIV AND THE CUSTODY OF MAN

The problem is not how powerful Artificial Intelligence may become, but what kind of man makes use of it. Because no technique perfects what does not exist and therefore, what is lacking in man cannot be delegated to the machine in order to be created […] Civilizations begin to decline when they cease to distinguish between what can be constructed and what instead must be safeguarded. And among all the things that man may lose, the most difficult to rebuild remains always the same: freedom.

— Contemporary ecclesial affairs—

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Reading the first encyclical of a Pontiff one year after the beginning of his pontificate is always a delicate exercise, especially when the subject addressed belongs to one of the most complex and controversial territories of our time: Artificial Intelligence. The risk is twofold: on the one hand demanding from the text what it does not intend to be, on the other attributing to it what it does not say. This methodological clarification is necessary from the outset, because Magnificent Humanity was not conceived as a technological manifesto nor as a philosophical treatise on the nature of Artificial Intelligence. Perhaps it is precisely here that a first impression of disorientation arises in the theologian accustomed to the great speculative encyclicals of the twentieth century. Indeed, anyone expecting a document modelled on The human race, Development of Peoples, Centennial year or Faith and Reason may therefore be surprised. Moreover, within the magisterium of the Roman Pontiffs one may distinguish at least two major types of documents: texts that speak above all to the present, to the ecclesial community, to society, to politics and to the urgencies of their own time; texts which, with the passing of years, inevitably remain bound to their historical season and whose principal value no longer consists in offering direct responses to present problems but in allowing certain passages, crises and developments in the life of the Church to be understood. One example among many may be You will be surprised, issued by Gregory XVI in 1832, whose socio-political assumptions cannot be extracted from that specific historical context and mechanically transferred to contemporary society. There are then documents which, although likewise born within a precise historical season, address primarily questions touching the enduring foundations of faith and Christian anthropology and therefore continue to speak beyond their own time; one may think, with different characteristics, of The splendor of truth by John Paul II or Spe salvi by Benedict XVI.

It is naturally still too early to establish to which of these two genres Magnificent Humanity belongs, but a first impression is that Leo XIV has chosen to speak to the historical present, offering criteria of orientation before a transformation already underway rather than elaborating a synthesis intended to constitute a long-term theological reference. Leo XIV does not approach the problem by asking whether machines can truly think, nor does he enter into the distinction between intelligence, consciousness and computation. Is this perhaps a structural limitation?

Rather than a limitation, it appears to be the choice of a different path, outlined from the very first pages: to read technological transformation as a question concerning above all the vocation of man, his way of inhabiting the world and of ordering his own action. In this perspective, the centre of the encyclical does not appear to be Artificial Intelligence as an autonomous object of analysis, but the human subject who develops and uses it. This orientation emerges with particular clarity in Chapter VI (cf. NN. 95-99), where the Holy Father recalls the risk that technical efficiency may be assumed as the prevailing criterion for organising human action and insists that progress is inseparable from the formation of conscience, personal responsibility and man’s capacity to order means toward genuinely human ends. From this derives the document’s emphasis not so much on the limitation of the machine as on the quality of the subject who employs it. This choice also emerges in the symbolic architecture of the text. The encyclical opens its argument through two biblical images that the Holy Father uses as interpretative keys for the entire document (cf. Chapter I, NN. 8-12). The first is the account of Babel (cf. Gen 11:1-9): men decide to build a city and a tower “with its top in the sky” in order to affirm their own self-sufficiency and “make a name” for themselves; the result is not greater unity but confusion of languages and dispersion. The second image is the rebuilding of Jerusalem under Nehemiah (cf. Neh 2-6): a destroyed city is rebuilt not to exalt anyone’s power but through an ordered, shared work directed towards enabling a people once more to inhabit and live. Through these two images, the document does not oppose technology and non-technology, but two spiritually opposed forms of building: on the one hand, a work born of human self-sufficiency, of the claim to master heaven and of a uniformity that sacrifices the person to efficiency; on the other, a patient reconstruction, shared and ordered toward God, in which the common good does not arise from power but from the responsibility of a people that restores relationships before rebuilding walls.

Yet a question remains open and will inevitably accompany the reading of the entire text: whether safeguarding the person and recalling responsibility are sufficient to address a phenomenon that concerns not merely the use of new instruments but the progressive transfer to technical apparatuses of acts belonging properly to the person’s knowing, judging and deliberating.

I. CONTINUITY AND DISCONTINUITY: THE PROBLEM IS NOT TECHNOLOGY, BUT THE POINT FROM WHICH IT IS VIEWED

One of the first questions that the reader inevitably raises before this encyclical is whether we are dealing with continuity with the great magisterium of the twentieth century or with a document which, while remaining within the same ecclesial current, belongs to a different level of theological, cultural and intellectual development. The answer cannot be univocal: from the standpoint of fundamental contents, the text clearly stands in continuity with the Church’s social doctrine. Yet this does not oblige one to maintain that we are dealing with a document of the same speculative depth, the same capacity for elaboration or the same qualitative level that characterised some of the great encyclicals of the previous century. To recognise this difference does not mean to formulate a negative judgement on the magisterium of Leo XIV — each age develops its own languages, sensibilities and priorities — but to acknowledge that not all magisterial documents are constructed with the same degree of speculative elaboration, nor do they possess the same capacity to generate theological categories destined to exercise a lasting influence on the cultural and historical plane.

Already in the introduction Leo XIV recalls the task entrusted to every generation: to shape its own time while safeguarding the dignity of the person, promoting justice and making fraternity possible, reaffirming that the permanent risk is that of building an inhuman world precisely at the moment when man’s capacity to transform reality increases. Continuity with previous social magisterium is evident; nevertheless, the point of observation chosen by the text appears different. Pius XII developed his magisterium through a strong work of conceptual clarification: he distinguished levels of discourse, delimited categories and tended to construct argumentative architectures in which every concept occupied a precise place. An approach sustained principally by constant engagement with the great theological tradition of the Church — from the Fathers to the Doctors — and by the classical metaphysical framework, especially in its scholastic elaboration, assumed as an instrument to safeguard the order between nature and grace, reason and faith, history and truth. Paul VI tended to read the great historical processes — economic development, social transformations, relations among peoples, modernisation — seeking to understand their consequences for man, for his dignity, for his freedom and for the forms of human coexistence. More than delimiting concepts, he sought to construct a vision capable of holding together history, society, development and the vocation of the person. John Paul II addressed the questions of his time by constantly bringing them back to the question of man. His great categories — person, truth, freedom, work, body, conscience — were not presented as isolated themes but as elements of a unified vision in which man is understood as a moral subject called to truth and responsibility. For this reason, his documents normally do not limit themselves to indicating practical orientations but tend to construct a true interpretation of man and history. Leo XIV, by contrast, does not enter into the problem of Artificial Intelligence by asking whether computational processes can truly be considered forms of intelligence or whether calculation may replace the human act of knowing. A choice that emerges clearly above all in the way the document defines the task of discernment: not to understand how far technology may go, but to establish towards which ends it ought to be directed. From this derives an important shift: the problem is not placed first of all on the level of efficiency but on the level of human judgement. The question that remains open, therefore, is not whether machines may become more intelligent, but whether man, progressively delegating acts that belong to his personal experience, still maintains mastery over his own action or instead ends up adapting himself to the logic of the instruments he has built. For this reason the encyclical insists less upon the nature of the instrument and more upon the responsibility of the subject who uses it. This orientation emerges with particular clarity in Chapter V (cf. n. 87), where Leo XIV states that the decisive criterion does not consist in the development of technical capacity as such, but in the question concerning the subject who governs it and the end towards which it is ordered. Thus, the decisive question is not what machines are able to do, but what man chooses to become through what he builds. In this sense the document recalls that technological development cannot be evaluated exclusively on the basis of efficiency or increased operational capacities, but must be judged in light of the consequences it produces for the person and for social life. The text insists, in fact, that no innovation may be considered beneficial simply because it is possible or effective, but must be subjected to discernment regarding the human good it is called to serve (cf. Chapter III, NN. 60-64).

A question nevertheless remains open and will inevitably accompany subsequent debate: whether the appeal to safeguarding the human is sufficient or whether it becomes necessary to ask also how technologies modify the concrete exercise of judgement, freedom and conscience. Therefore, if this encyclical succeeds in seriously reopening this question, it will already have accomplished something important.

(II). ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE: SAFEGUARDING MAN OR UNDERSTANDING WHAT HE IS BECOMING?

It is probably at this point that one of the most distinctive elements of the encyclical is concentrated. Leo XIV does not approach Artificial Intelligence beginning from the question concerning the nature of intelligence or the possibility that artificial processes may reproduce human thought. In Chapter III (cf. NN. 52-58), the document instead recalls the risk that technology, from being an instrument ordered to human action, may progressively become an environment capable of influencing perception, relationships and forms of experience.

Subsequently, in Chapter IV (cf. NN. 71-76), addressing the theme of delegating decision-making functions, the encyclical insists that no technical system can replace personal responsibility and moral judgement and moral judgement. From this emerges the central point of the text: the decisive issue is not what the machine may become, but what man risks ceasing to exercise. For this reason the document does not concentrate its interest on the technical description of Artificial Intelligence systems, but repeatedly returns to the question of the human subject who designs and employs them.

This orientation emerges in Chapter II (cf. NN. 28-32), where the Supreme Pontiff recalls the criterion of the dignity of the person as the measure of progress; in Chapter IV (cf. NN. 79-82), where he insists upon the responsibility that accompanies every technological decision; and in Chapter VI (cf. NN. 112-116), where the common good is presented as the criterion for evaluating the effects of digital transformations upon social life. In this perspective, the problem is not placed primarily on the level of the machine’s performance, but on the relationship between technical development and human responsibility. The implicit question of the encyclical therefore seems to be: how can man be prevented from being reduced to a function of the system that he himself has constructed? It is a serious and necessary question. Yet precisely here there also emerges a possible limitation — or perhaps, more correctly, a deliberate choice. For the text does not seem willing to confront fully a question that today appears increasingly decisive: not only what man must safeguard, but what man is becoming.

The revolution of Artificial Intelligence concerns not merely new instruments. It touches the way in which we perceive time, exercise judgement, form relationships, understand the body, live freedom and form conscience. From this point of view, the problem is not simply preventing the machine from replacing man; the problem is understanding whether man, progressively entrusting to external apparatuses increasingly extensive parts of his experience, risks modifying the very way of being human. The encyclical approaches this question in Chapter VI (cf. NN. 103-108), when it recalls the danger of a progressive reduction of human experience to what can be measured, processed and technically administered, insisting that the person never coincides with the sum of his functions nor with the processes he is capable of delegating. Yet the document does not pursue this line of reflection towards a systematic anthropological elaboration and does not enter extensively into the question of how technologies affect the structure of the cognitive act, of judgement and of deliberation. Its principal interest remains moral and social. For this reason, the most fruitful contribution that the text may offer to ecclesial debate consists not so much in having spoken the final word on Artificial Intelligence, as in having reminded us of what must remain the first: the human person.

In this sense, particular significance is acquired by the reminder contained in Chapter VII (cf. n. 124), where Leo XIV affirms that authentic progress does not coincide with the increase of operational capacity, but with the growth of man in responsibility and communion, recalling that no technological advancement can substitute the proper value of the person.

III. A FIRST CONCLUSION: BETWEEN THE CUSTODY OF MAN AND DENIED FREEDOM

It would be unfair to read this encyclical by asking from it what it did not intend to offer. We are not, in fact, before a document constructed like some of the great encyclicals of twentieth-century social magisterium, nor before a text whose task is the theoretical analysis of Artificial Intelligence in its conceptual structures, in the relationship between technology and human act, or in the consequences that automation may produce for the understanding of intelligence and freedom. Magnificent Humanity chooses another path: not to begin from the question of what technology is, but from the question of what kind of man is formed through the use of technology. We are before a text that chooses a different way: to recall the Church and the world to the safeguarding of man in the age of digital transformation. There remains open — and perhaps it will need to be addressed in the years to come — a further question: whether safeguarding man means only protecting his dignity, or also understanding more deeply what is happening to his intelligence, his freedom and his experience of reality.

If this encyclical succeeds in seriously reopening this question, it will already have accomplished something important. Reading this encyclical, I could not avoid comparing it with certain reflections I developed in my recent book “Freedom denied” (“Denied Freedom”, Editions The island of Patmos, January 2026), dedicated to the relationship between freedom, ethics, Artificial Intelligence and Christian anthropology. This is not a matter of superimposing a personal work upon the magisterium of the Roman Pontiff — which by nature, purpose and authority belongs to an entirely different order — but of placing two different points of observation into dialogue before the same question. The encyclical chooses to address the theme beginning from the Church’s social doctrine. This orientation emerges particularly in Chapter II (cf. NN. 28-32), where Leo XIV recalls that technical progress cannot be assumed as a self-sufficient criterion of development and insists that every innovation must be evaluated in the light of the good of the person and of the quality of the human relationships it contributes to generate. In my book, by contrast, I chose a different point of departure: to question the relationship between technology and the human act of knowing, judging and deciding, developing this reflection in light of the classical theological tradition and, in particular, the thought of Saint Thomas Aquinas. The decisive point was not to establish whether the machine may become more efficient than man, but to ask whether there exist acts proper to the person that cannot be delegated without altering the human itself. Within this perspective, I resumed one of the central intuitions of Thomistic synthesis: moral discernment arises from the unity between ratio and understanding, between the capacity to analyse and the capacity to grasp truth in its unity. Judgement does not coincide with calculation. And it is precisely here that the Thomistic principle acquires decisive significance. In my book I returned to the celebrated axiom: «Grace does not destroy nature, but finish (“Grace does not destroy nature but perfects it”, QUESTION, I, I, 8 ad 2)». This principle does not affirm that grace replaces what is lacking in man; it affirms the opposite: it brings a real nature to fulfilment without eliminating or replacing it. Applied analogically to the relationship between man and Artificial Intelligence, the principle leads to a radical question: if grace perfects nature but does not replace it, can technology perfect faculties that man does not possess? The answer I attempted to develop is negative: Artificial Intelligence may amplify existing capacities, accelerate processes and support complex operations; but it cannot generate what is absent: it does not produce consciousness where there is no consciousness, it does not generate judgement where moral formation does not exist, it does not create discernment where interiority is lacking.

The problem is not how powerful Artificial Intelligence becomes, but what kind of man makes use of it. Because no technique perfects what does not exist and therefore what is lacking in man cannot be delegated to the machine in order that it may be created. In the book I dedicated to this theme, I explain that no civilisation has ever collapsed because it possessed instruments that were too powerful. Civilisations begin to decline when they cease to distinguish between what can be built and what instead must be safeguarded. And among all the things that man may lose, the most difficult to rebuild has always remained the same: freedom.

Rome, 25 May 2026

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NOT A METAPHYSICS OF ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE: LEO XIV AND THE CUSTODY OF MAN

The problem is not how powerful Artificial Intelligence becomes., but on what type of man to use it. Because no technologywas going perfects what does not exist and, therefore, what is missing in man cannot be delegated to the machine to be created […] Civilizations begin to decline when they stop distinguishing between what can be built and what, on the contrary, must be guarded. And among all the things that man can lose, the most difficult to recover always remains the same: freedom.

- Ecclesial news -

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Read the first encyclical of a Pontiff one year after the beginning of his pontificate, it is always a delicate exercise, especially when the topic addressed belongs to one of the most complex and controversial territories of our time.: Artificial Intelligence. The risk is twofold: on the one hand, demand from the text what it is not intended to be; on the other, attribute to him what he does not say. This methodological precision is necessary from the beginning, why Magnificent Humanity It is not born as a technological manifesto nor as a philosophical treatise on the nature of Artificial Intelligence. Perhaps it is precisely here that a first impression of confusion is born in the theologian accustomed to the great speculative encyclicals of the 20th century.. Indeed, who expected a document built according to the model of The human race, Development of Peoples, Centennial year O Faith and Reason you might be surprised. Otherwise, Within the magisterium of the Roman Pontiffs, at least two major types of documents can be distinguished.: texts that speak mainly to the present, to the ecclesial community, to society, to politics and the urgencies of his own time; texts that, over the years, They inevitably become dated and whose main value ceases to consist of offering direct answers to the problems of the present and becomes a way that allows us to understand certain passages., crises and evolutions of the life of the Church. An example among many could be You will be surprised, promulgated by Gregory XVI in 1832, whose sociopolitical conceptions cannot be extrapolated from that determined historical context nor mechanically transferred to contemporary society.. Then there are, the documents that, although they were born within a certain historical period, They mainly address questions that touch on the permanent foundations of faith and Christian anthropology and, therefore, They continue to speak beyond their own time; just think, with different features: The splendor of truth of John Paul II or Spe salvi of Benedict XVI. It is still too early to establish which of these two genres it belongs to. Magnificent Humanity, but a first impression is that Leo XIV has chosen to speak to the historical present, offering guiding criteria in the face of a transformation already in progress rather than developing a synthesis intended to become a long-range theological reference.

Leo XIV does not face the problem wondering whether machines can really think nor does it fall into the distinction between intelligence, consciousness and computation. Is this a structural limit?? More than a limit, It seems to be about choosing a different path, outlined from the first pages: read technological transformation as a question that concerns above all the vocation of man, to their way of inhabiting the world and ordering their own action. From this perspective, The center of the encyclical does not seem to be Artificial Intelligence as an autonomous object of analysis, but the human subject that develops and uses it. This orientation emerges with particular clarity in chapter VI (cf. NN. 95-99), where the Augusto Author remembers the risk of technical efficiency being assumed as the predominant criterion for the organization of human work and insists that progress is inseparable from the formation of consciousness, of personal responsibility and man's ability to direct means towards authentically human ends. From this derives the document's insistence not so much on the limit of the machine, how much about the quality of the subject who uses it. This choice also appears in the symbolic structure of the text. The encyclical effectively opens its reasoning through two biblical images that the Holy Father uses as a key to reading the entire document. (cf. chapter I, NN. 8–12).

The first is the story of Babel (cf. GN 11,1-9): men decide to build a city and a tower "whose top reaches to the sky" to assert their self-sufficiency and "make a name for themselves"; the result is not greater unity, but the confusion of languages ​​and the dispersion. The second image is the reconstruction of Jerusalem guided by Nehemiah (cf. Born 2-6): a destroyed city is rebuilt not to exalt someone's power, but through an ordered work, shared and aimed at allowing a people to return to inhabit and live. Through these two images the document does not contrast technical and non-technical, but two opposite ways of building: in the first case, the work tends to replace the good of man; in the second, remains subordinated to the good of the human community.

However, a question remains open that will inevitably accompany the reading of the entire text: If the custody of the person and the call to responsibility are enough to confront a phenomenon that does not only refer to the use of new instruments, but to the progressive transfer to technical devices of acts that belong to knowledge, the judgment and deliberation of the person.

I. CONTINUITY AND DISCONTINUITY: THE PROBLEM IS NOT THE TECHNIQUE, BUT THE POINT FROM WHICH IT IS LOOKED AT

One of the first questions that the reader inevitably asks himself when faced with this encyclical is whether we find ourselves in continuity with the great teaching of the 20th century or before a document that, even situated within the same ecclesial channel, belongs to a different level of theological construction, cultural and qualitative. The answer cannot be univocal: under the profile of the fundamental contents, The text is clearly situated in continuity with the Social Doctrine of the Church. However, This does not imply affirming that we are faced with a document of the same speculative thickness., of the same capacity for elaboration or the same qualitative level that characterized some of the great encyclicals of the last century. Recognizing this difference does not mean formulating a negative judgment about the teaching of Leo XIV — each era develops languages., own sensitivities and priorities - but to recognize that not all magisterial documents are constructed with the same degree of speculative elaboration nor do they have the same capacity to generate theological categories intended to have a stable impact on the cultural and historical level..

Already in the introduction Leo XIV remembers the task entrusted to each generation of shaping its own time while safeguarding the dignity of the person, promoting justice and making fraternity possible; reiterating that the permanent risk is that of building an inhuman world precisely at the moment when the human capacity to transform reality is increasing. The continuity with the teachings of the social teaching is evident; but the point of observation chosen by the text seems different. Pius XII developed his teaching through a strong work of conceptual clarification: distinguished the levels of discourse, It delimited the categories and tended to build argumentative architectures in which each concept occupied a precise place.. An approach sustained mainly in constant confrontation with the great theological tradition of the Church - from the Fathers to the Doctors - and by the classical metaphysical approach, especially in its scholastic elaboration, assumed as an instrument to guard the order between nature and grace, reason and faith, history and truth. Paul VI tended to read the great historical processes - economic development, social transformations, relations between people, modernization — trying to understand its consequences on man, about your dignity, about their freedom and about the forms of human coexistence. More than defining concepts, sought to build a vision capable of keeping history together, sociedad, development and vocation of the person. John Paul II faced the questions of his time by constantly returning them to the question about man. Its major categories — person, TRUE, freedom, job, body, consciousness — were not presented as isolated themes, but as elements of a unitary vision in which man is understood as a moral subject called to truth and responsibility.. That is why their documents are usually not limited to indicating practical guidelines, but rather they tend to construct a true interpretation of man and history. XIV lion, instead, does not address the problem of Artificial Intelligence by asking whether the computational process can be assimilated to intelligence or whether calculation can replace the human act of knowing.. This choice emerges clearly above all in the way the document defines the task of discernment.: not understanding how far technology can go, but to establish the purposes within which it must be oriented. This results in an important change.: The problem is not primarily at the level of efficiency, but in that of human judgment. The question that remains open is not whether machines can become smarter., but if the man, progressively delegating acts that belong to your personal experience, does he still retain control of his own work or ends up adapting to the logic of the instruments he has built. For this reason the encyclical insists less on the nature of the instrument and more on the responsibility of the subject who uses it.. This orientation emerges with particular clarity in chapter V (cf. n. 87), where Leo XIV states that the decisive criterion does not consist of the development of technical capacity as such, but in the question about the subject that governs it and the end to which it is ordered. Therefore, the decisive question is not what machines can do, but what men choose to become through that which builds. In this sense, the document recalls that technological development cannot be evaluated exclusively on the basis of efficiency or the increase in operational capabilities., but must be judged in light of the consequences it produces on the person and on social life.. The text insists, indeed, in that no innovation can be considered beneficial simply because it is possible or effective, but must be subjected to discernment about the human good that it is called to serve. (cf. chapter III, NN. 60-64).

Remains, however, open a question that will inevitably accompany the subsequent debate: if the call to the custody of what is human is sufficient or if it is also, It is necessary to question the way in which technologies modify the specific exercise of judgment, of freedom and conscience. So, whether this encyclical has the merit of seriously reopening this question, will have already done something important.

(II). ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE: CUSTODY THE MAN OR UNDERSTAND WHAT HE IS BECOME?

It is probably at this point where one of the most characteristic nuclei of the encyclical is concentrated.. Leo XIV does not address Artificial Intelligence from the question about the nature of intelligence or about the possibility of artificial processes reproducing human thought.. In chapter III (cf. NN. 52-58) The document rather reminds us of the risk that technology, of an instrument ordered to human action, progressively tends to transform into an environment capable of influencing perception, relationships and forms of experience. Later, in chapter IV (cf. NN. 71-76), facing the issue of delegation of decision-making functions, The encyclical insists that no technical device can replace personal responsibility or moral judgment. From here emerges the central point of the text: the decisive question is not what the machine can become, but what man runs the risk of ceasing to exercise. For this reason, the document does not concentrate its interest on the technical description of Artificial Intelligence systems., but repeatedly returns to the question of the human subject who projects and uses them. This orientation emerges in chapter II (cf. NN. 28-32), where the Supreme Pontiff recalls the criterion of the dignity of the person as a measure of progress; in chapter IV (cf. NN. 79-82), where he insists on the responsibility that accompanies every technological decision; and in chapter VI (cf. NN. 112-116), where the common good is indicated as a criterion to judge the effects of digital transformations on social life. In this perspective, the problem is not posed primarily at the level of the machine's performance, but in the relationship between technical development and human responsibility.

The implicit question of the encyclical seems to be: How can man be prevented from being reduced to the system that he himself has built?? It is a serious and necessary question. However, precisely here emerges a possible limit - or perhaps, more correctly, a deliberate choice. Because the text does not seem to want to fully address an issue that today appears increasingly decisive.: not only what is it that man must guard, but what man is becoming.

The Artificial Intelligence revolution It is not limited only to new instruments. Affects the way we perceive time, we exercise judgment, we build relationships, we understand the body, we live freedom and form conscience. From this perspective, The problem is not simply to prevent the machine from replacing man; but in understanding if man, by progressively entrusting increasingly larger parts of their experience to external devices, runs the risk of modifying the very essence of the human being.

The encyclical approaches this question in chapter VI (cf. NN. 103-108), when he remembers the danger of a progressive reduction of human experience to that which can be measured, technically prepared and managed, insisting that the person never coincides with the sum of his functions or with the processes he is capable of delegating. However, The document does not continue this line of reflection to a systematic anthropological elaboration and does not go into the question of how technologies affect the structure of the cognitive act., of judgment and deliberation. His main interest remains moral and social.. For this reason, The most fruitful contribution that the text can offer to the ecclesial debate does not consist so much in having pronounced the last word on Artificial Intelligence., as in having remembered what must remain in the first place: the human person. In this sense, the so-called content in chapter VII takes on particular importance. (cf. n. 124), where Leo XIV affirms that authentic progress does not coincide with the increase in operational capacity, but with the growth of man in responsibility and communion, remembering that no technical advance can replace the personal value of the person.

III. A FIRST CONCLUSION: BETWEEN THE CUSTODY OF MAN AND THE DENIED FREEDOM

It would be unfair to read this encyclical demanding from him what he did not intend to offer.. Magnificent Humanity choose another path: not starting from the question about what the technique is, but from the question about what man is formed by the use of technology. We are faced with a text that chooses a different path: call the Church and the world to guard man in the time of digital transformation. A further question remains open – and perhaps will have to be addressed in the coming years.: If guarding man means only protecting his dignity or also understanding more deeply what is happening to his intelligence, with its freedom and with its experience of reality. If this encyclical has the merit of seriously reopening this question, will have already done something important.

Reading this encyclical I have not been able to avoid a dialogue with some reflections that I have developed in my recent book Freedom denied (Freedom denied, Editions The island of Patmos, January 2026), dedicated to the relationship between freedom, ethics, Artificial Intelligence and Christian Anthropology. It is not a matter of superimposing a personal work on the teaching of the Roman Pontiff - who by nature, purpose and authority belongs to a completely different order - but to establish a dialogue between two different points of observation regarding the same question. The encyclical chooses to address the issue starting from the Social Doctrine of the Church. This orientation emerges particularly in chapter II (cf. NN. 28-32), where Leo. In my book I chose, instead, a different starting point: interrogate the relationship between technology and the human act of knowing, judge and decide, developing this reflection in the light of the classical theological tradition and particularly the thought of Saint Thomas Aquinas. The decisive point was not to establish whether the machine can become more efficient than man, but to ask if there are acts specific to the person that cannot be delegated without altering the human being.. From this perspective I returned to one of the central intuitions of the Thomist synthesis: Moral discernment is born from the unity between ratio e understanding, between the ability to analyze and the ability to grasp the true in its unity. The judgment does not coincide with the calculation. And it is precisely here where the Thomistic principle acquires a decisive meaning.. In my book I took up the famous axiom: «Grace does not destroy nature, but finish (Grace does not destroy nature, but perfects it, QUESTION, I, I, 8 ad 2)». This principle does not affirm that grace replaces what man lacks.; claims exactly the opposite: complete a real nature, without removing or replacing it. Applied analogically to the relationship between man and Artificial Intelligence, the beginning leads to a radical question: If grace perfects nature, but it does not replace it, Can technology perfect faculties that man does not possess?? The answer I have tried to develop is negative.: Artificial Intelligence can amplify existing capabilities, speed up processes, sustain complex operations; but it cannot generate what is missing: does not produce consciousness where there is no consciousness, does not generate judgment where there is no moral formation, does not create discernment where interiority is lacking.

The problem is not how powerful Artificial Intelligence becomes., but on what type of man to use it. Because no technology perfects what does not exist and, therefore, what is missing in man cannot be delegated to the machine to be created. In the book that I have dedicated to this topic I explain that no civilization has ever collapsed because it had too powerful instruments.. Civilizations begin to decline when they stop distinguishing between what can be built and what, on the contrary, must be guarded. And among all the things that man can lose, the most difficult to recover always remains the same: freedom.

Rome, 25 May 2026

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I CAN'T BE SILENT: THE DAY WHEN CRIMINAL LAW DISCOVERED THAT IT WAS BORN IN THE SACRESTY

He who remains silent cannot affirm with systematic enthusiasm: «modern criminal law - of which, moreover, canon law is a precursor in many aspects […] - distinguishes between the fact and the responsibility".

—Hypatia's cogitatory—

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I'm asking for a friendly cat, this time not from the city but with a fair amount of legal reading behind him, who asks whether the entire manual should really be updated to adapt it to the latest discovery of those who cannot remain silent and who for this reason affirms with systematic enthusiasm: «modern criminal law - of which, moreover, canon law is a precursor in many aspects […] - distinguishes between the fact and the responsibility" (cf.. see article who).

Now, the cat in question, who did not attend either the Alma Mater Studiorum or the Lateran University, but it still distinguishes, with a certain obstinacy of times gone by, between common law, Roman law and modern codifications, he asks if he missed something: if Cesare Beccaria, Ludwig Feuerbach and the entire modern criminal law construction must be reread as an appendix of the ecclesiastical forum, perhaps waiting for an amended reprint of the manuals, or whether it is not better to distinguish between historical contributions and systematic genealogies, avoiding easy enthusiasms of fatherhood.

Because it is one thing to recognize that medieval canon law, starting from the great Bolognese Glossators, has affected certain institutions such as imputability, intention, procedure; it is another thing to attribute to it a paternity function, even more so if you even try to mock between the lines other jurists.

The use of the category of «forerunner» even when attenuated by vague formulas such as "in many respects", ends up suggesting a systematic continuity that the history of law does not allow us to support regarding what arises within the crisis of the confessional state and the legal development of the modern age, as if the history of law were a straight line and not a complex stratification.

The cat, confused but not completely clueless, it is therefore limited to a simple question, formulated with due feline prudence: if this is really the principle, perhaps it would not be appropriate to warn the law faculties before they continue to teach the history of criminal law in a way that is now hopelessly outdated, also suggesting the wise reading of the pearls of wisdom of those who cannot remain silent? We must therefore take note of a fact: if the criterion is the "forerunner" one, then modern criminal law was born in the sacristy.

This world full of "unsolved", as those who cannot remain silent like to repeat …

From the island of Patmos, 30 April 2026

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