Critics of AI-generated art have a powerful new ally: His Holiness the Bishop of Rome (Episcopus Romanus), Primate of Italy (Primatus Italiae), and Supreme Pontiff of the Universal Church (Summus Pontifex Ecclesiae Universalis).

In a post on X Friday morning, Pope Leo XIV detailed the spiritual difference between human-generated art and art that is generated by machines, as part of a call to preserve human art from the encroachment of AI.

“In this era of artificial intelligence, it is becoming urgent to distinguish human art from what machines produce,” the Servus Servorum Dei wrote. “There is an ontological difference, even before an aesthetic one, between art and what a machine can generate through statistical calculation based on millions of images created by others. Algorithms lack the spark of humanity.”

Pope Leo XIV gave a more detailed statement on AI in an encyclical letter in May, which emphasized the importance of human dignity in a world of increasing automation.

But that hasn’t stopped AI companies from lobbying the supreme pontiff. According to a recent New York Times report, Anthropic has actively lobbied the Vatican to reconsider its position on non-human consciousness — apparently finding little success.

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