Pope Aligns With Anthropic, Co-Founder on AI Debate

When Pope Leo XIV placed the Roman Catholic Church in the middle of the AI debate on Monday, he did it with unusually public help from one of the industry's giants, Anthropic. At the rollout for his 42,000-word encyclical on artificial intelligence, Leo acknowledged the rare alliance for the Holy See and thanked Anthropic co-founder Christopher Olah, the Washington Post reports, for helping "together to find the way for humanity in this time of artificial intelligence." A Vatican official conceded that the presence of Olah, who was seated near Leo, was unusual and an indication that the pope is serious about engaging the world on the topic, per the National Catholic Reporter.

Olah, who was on a Vatican panel on the issue with the pope and theologians, said in his remarks that AI decisions should not be left to technologists alone and urged religious leaders and other outsiders to act as a check on the industry. Anthropic, creator of the Claude chatbot and the Mythos model, has positioned itself as a safety-focused company, pushing for stricter AI rules and warning that advanced systems could destroy jobs and even show early signs of consciousness—claims many in tech dispute. That stance has drawn criticism from President Trump and prominent investors, per the Post. Anthropic also is at odds with the Pentagon over conditions on using its tools in warfare; the encyclical presses for clear limits on military AI.

A historian of technology at the University of Washington likened Leo's letter to Pope Leo XIII's 1891 critique of unchecked industrial capitalism, per the Post. Margaret O'Mara noted a key difference: This time, the Vatican is working directly with industry. But then, she said, "We're in this weird uncharted territory in which politics, business and now religion are so bound up in one another." The industry responded with memes suggesting Anthropic's recruiters had landed the pope, who would be joining its technical staff, per Business Insider. O'Mara, on the other hand, suggested it's the startup that's looking to partner with an institution with real staying power.

• The alliance, and whether it's appropriate, has been the talk of the Vatican, Religious News Service reports here.