AP
Paris
Pope Leo XIV warned Friday that a “paradise of machines” risked undermining humanity as he opened a trip to France by posing fundamental questions about what it means to be human in the age of artificial intelligence, nuclear arms race and other threats to life itself.
Leo raised existential questions about scientific progress, life and human rights during his opening speech to President Emmanuel Macron and diplomats at the Elysee Palace.
Given the wars plaguing Europe and the Middle East, he reaffirmed the Vatican’s opposition to nuclear weapons and said the nuclear deterrence doctrine was “mistaken” since it was just fueling a new arms race.
“Peace is not a balance of power; rather, it is built day by day through dialogue and justice,” he said.
Leo arrived in Paris at the start of four intense days in France, where the Catholic Church has lost ground in influencing ethical issues. Leo seems keen to emphasise Europe’s Christian roots and try to push the church’s message about the value and dignity of human life.
in a country where the right to abortion was enshrined in the Constitution in 2024 and where lawmakers recently gave final approval to a bill allowing adults with incurable illnesses to receive lethal medication.
The French Catholic hierarchy strongly opposed the measures, in keeping with Catholic teaching that human life must be protected and defended from conception until natural death. But the French hierarchy has lost much of its influence amid the secularising trends at play across Western Europe as well as a credibility crisis stemming from France’s reckoning with its legacy of clergy sexual abuse.
