Dear St. Rita Parishioners,

            The Pope’s approach to AI is rooted, importantly, not so much in its moral character as such, but rather in its effect on man. The result is his contrasting approach between the Tower of Babel (Gen 11:1-9) and Nehemiah’s rebuilding the walls of Jerusalem after the Babylonian Exile (cf. Neh 2-6). One, Babel, is rooted in pride and human achievement. The other, Nehemiah, is rooted in shared responsibility in responding to the command and call of God (cf. MH 8). The Pope is indicating to us that we can use technology, in particular this fast-evolving technology that we call Artificial Intelligence, as a means to our own pride or as a means to promote and serve the common good. 

            This sort of moral effect on man is indeed a consideration for every single morally consequential action we take in our lives. Doing good makes us better. Doing evil makes us worse. The Pope’s characterization of the nature of this good and evil in Magnifica Humanitas, however, is worthy of our consideration, because it can be readily misunderstood as well. Babel, he says, “was a project conceived without reference to God, supported by a uniformity that eliminated diversity and that chose homogenization over communion…[and] thus reveals the limits of any effort that, however grandiose, arises from self-affirmation, sacrifices human dignity for efficiency and aspires to reach heaven without God’s blessing” (MH 7).

            Our current political sensitivity may tend to make us hear this language precisely as political, and while it certainly has implications for politics, we should resist the temptation to partisan-ize the Pope’s words unnecessarily. To do so would be to miss the deeper truths that he wants to impart and that God wants us to hear. Therefore, we can consider the key elements of his words one at a time.

            First, “without reference to God” and “without God’s blessing.” To undertake anything without reference to God is to relegate Him to the sidelines, which is done for a few reasons. One is simple forgetfulness, forgetfulness that God not only is here present with us, but that He has created us and given us direction. “In Him we live and move and have our being,” as St. Paul reminds the Athenians (Acts 17:28). Another reason is a false humility which believes that God has no interest in the things that interest me. The truth (which is real humility) is that God has interest in these things precisely because He is interested in me, not out of a desire to control, but from a desire to love. A third reason is the belief that somehow God’s will for me will be less good than my will for me, whether because I think God wants to control me or because I am just attached to my own selfish desires. Sadly, whatever one’s reason for forgetting God, doing so always results in things being worse off, and sometimes terribly so. Modern man (since the Enlightenment in particular) has tried to construct a world without God, throwing off “traditional” morality and creating his own new thing, and it has resulted in unprecedented death, destruction, sadness, and pain. 

            Second, uniformity without diversity and homogenization over communion. “Diversity” is a loaded word in the political sphere, and so we want to parse its use here carefully. We are Catholics, which is a Greek word meaning “universal” – from “kata” meaning “according to” and “holos” meaning “the whole”. We rightly understand the meaning of the word to indicate that the salvation which Jesus Christ won for us is applicable to all men without exception, and that all men without exception are called to faith in Him, and that “there is no other Name under the sun by which we are to be saved” (Acts 4:12). Since in this idea itself there is both unity and diversity, we must look to the principle of that unity in order to understand how a proper diversity does not machinate against unity, and vice versa. 

            The principle of unity can be considered in two ways: in the intellect and in the will. Intellectually, the principle of unity is faith. The Church is “One”, as we say in the Creed, and this is because of our common faith. Thus, Catholics are united with each other through that belief in a way that we are not united with Protestants or members of other religions. We are united with others to a greater or lesser extent, then, according to the similarity of our beliefs. This type of unity could be considered by some as that uniformity or homogenization that the Pope decries, but it is absolutely NOT that! Indeed, without this unity of faith, diversity devolves into chaos, and communion dissolves into individuality and the dictatorship of relativism. 

            In the will, the principle of unity is charity. And, while charity can flow from one person to another even if there is not unity in (the True) Faith, it cannot flow reciprocally at its fullest without that unity of Faith. This is true simply because the Truth Faith reflects faithfully all the God in His Charity wants for His people, for the sake of Union. And therefore, true Charity ultimately seeks union in true Faith, since that enables deeper union with God Himself, which is the greatest joy and happiness man can reach. 

In human endeavors, however, such as that of technology, there is often some analogous union of faith (e.g. we all believe in the mission of this company, to varying degrees), and therefore there can be some analogous union in charity. In these endeavors it is of the utmost importance, then, that authentic charity as such be highlighted and its principles explicated. Such explication, including and perhaps especially from the Pope of Rome, may be the only place from which otherwise unbelieving men and women hear any serious guidance on the nature of charity as applied to their spheres of influence. It is a much harder conversation, as we know, when there is not common belief (for example when speaking literally to the entire world), because the search for common ground can be messy, time-consuming, and confusing. In such situations, diversity plays the role of ensuring that the decisions made by those in power (and/or in authority) are appropriately applicable and helpful for those who will be affected. It is imperative, then, that those in authority and power, then, have and exercise charity for the sake of the common good. This is a version of what is called “distributive justice” – the justice required from those in authority (in particular, government) to those who are governed. 

All of this is to say, in the end, that Faith and Charity hold each other together, as do unity and diversity.

            Lastly, self-affirmation and sacrificing human dignity. It should not be too difficult to figure out why the Pope mentions these dangers, but it is not inappropriate to wonder with St. Peter, “We have left everything to follow you. What then shall we have?” (Mt 19:27). Self-affirmation and the sacrificing of the human dignity of another is an attempt to grasp at the things I think I need in the midst of a precarious world where death and loss can be around every corner. Indeed, we carry the seeds of our own emptiness within us in our concupiscence and in the memory of past sin, and for those who have not received Christ’s forgiveness nor discovered that victory over sin is possible, the darkness can become so overwhelming that human dignity is forgotten for the sake of dealing with this incredibly profound interior wound. 

            The truth is, we are not forgotten by God precisely when we choose to forget ourselves. Remember Jesus’ response to Peter: “Truly, I say to you, in the new world, when the Son of man shall sit on his glorious throne, you who have followed me will also sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel. And every one who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or lands, for my name’s sake, will receive a hundredfold, and inherit eternal life” (Mt 19:28-29). A hundredfold! AND eternal life on top of it! Is there a better exchange? In other words, the need for self-affirmation or to achieve even at the cost of the dignity of another is a sinister twisting of the promise of God and the gift He has in store for us. As Catholics, we are not altruistic, since altruism (literally “other-ism”) suggests that there is nothing in it for me, and that it’s wrong to want some sort of reward or recompense. But God has placed the desire for life and union and love in the depths of our being, and it would be a rejection of Him to be so high-minded as to say, “Actually, it IS good for man to be alone, and I will gladly (but really, self-destructively) take that upon myself for the good of everyone else.” This is a savior complex, and is not how God has made us. “You have made us for Yourself, O Lord, and our hearts are restless until they rest in You!” St. Augustine breaks through that lie with remarkable dexterity and beauty. 

            The actual Catholic approach is for us to humble ourselves and to follow Christ, and to allow Him to exalt us (cf. Mt 23:12). Affirmation from God is much better than my own piddling affirmation of myself. And while mankind is really good at sacrificing the dignity of our fellow man (and our own, by means of sin), God would not begin to do such a thing, even if it killed Him. Which it did. 

In Christ,

Fr. Christensen