“Put the person before the algorithm,” Pope Leo XIV said on Saturday in Uruguay, warning that artificial intelligence (AI) must remain at the service of human dignity, as he called on the local Catholics to become “bridge builders” for the faith.
The message was delivered during a speech at the Catholic University of Uruguay, after celebrating Mass in the northwestern city of Paysandú, according to a report by Agence France-Presse.
His visit to the Latin American nation, which has seen a rise in gang violence, marks the first papal visit to Uruguay in nearly four decades.
Pope on AI, education
Speaking at the Catholic University of Uruguay, Leo said society was facing a “process of dehumanisation” through the growing use of AI in education.
The pope has repeatedly stressed the ethical use of AI since taking office, most notably in his encyclical Magnifica humanitas, where he said that “in the era of artificial intelligence, when human dignity is threatened by new forms of dehumanisation, ours is the pressing duty to remain profoundly human.”
Meanwhile, in Paysandú, Leo urged Catholics to become “bridge builders” who would “share the joy” of their faith in Uruguay.
In Uruguay, the proportion of people identifying as Catholic has declined sharply over the past three decades.
He then praised the country’s tradition of sharing the local herbal drink mate (pronounced ma-tay), which the faithful were drinking during the Mass.
The pope, who served as a missionary on the continent for 20 years, said the herbal drink “teaches us to share and be together.”
He also joked that “mate has even made its way to Rome.”
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Healthcare and violence
On Friday, Leo advocated for universal healthcare, after his recent lung cancer diagnosis reminded him of the “many men and women” who struggle to access early diagnosis and medical care.
He also said that every person should be able to “live with dignity, receive the care they need, and be accompanied until the natural end of his or her life.”
He made the remarks after implicitly referencing euthanasia, which was legalised in Uruguay in the previous year.
And on Saturday, Leo visited Montevideo’s Casavalle area, where gang violence has intensified as the country became a transit hub for cocaine trafficking.
“There are children in Uruguay who do not go to school for fear of never returning home,” he said, according to AFP.
After visiting the neighbourhood with the capital’s highest homicide rate, the pope added that children in a country with vast resources “should never have to go to bed hungry… Much less should they have to suffer violence to the point of losing their lives.”
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Wendellyn Mateo 
Lucia Caporalini