Pope Leo apologizes for Church's historic role in slavery

Summary

Reuters reports that Pope Leo issued his first papal encyclical, Magnifica Humanitas, on May 25, 2026, combining an apology for the Catholic Church’s historical involvement in slavery with warnings about artificial intelligence, warfare, and global instability. Leo acknowledged that Church authorities had delayed condemning slavery, sometimes regulated or legitimized the enslavement of non-Christians, and that medieval ecclesiastical institutions held slaves. He called slavery a “wound in Christian memory” and asked forgiveness on behalf of the Church. The article describes this as a more direct admission of institutional responsibility than earlier statements by John Paul II and Francis. The encyclical also urges governments to slow AI development, establish legal safeguards and independent oversight, protect workers and children, and prevent autonomous weapons from escaping meaningful human control. Anthropic co-founder Chris Olah attended the Vatican event and acknowledged that commercial incentives can conflict with responsible AI development. Leo further condemned the arms trade, criticized weakening international institutions, and warned that leaders might use war to distract from domestic problems. He described the traditional “just war” theory as outdated, a position presented as relevant to arguments used by Trump administration officials to defend the Iran war. The article provides no independent text of the encyclical or detailed response from those officials.