Pope Francis is the first pope to speak at the G7 summit and meet with Biden and world leaders

Pope Francisthe first pope to attend a G7 summiturged leaders of the world’s rich democracies on Friday to prioritize human dignity in the development and use artificial intelligencewarning that technology risks transforming human relationships into mere algorithms.

Francis was invited by Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, the summit host, to speak at a special session on the perils and promises of AI. He offered an ethical vision of an issue that is increasingly on the agenda of international, governmental summits and corporate boardrooms.

The pope said politicians must take the lead in ensuring AI remains human-centric, so decisions about when to use weapons – or even less lethal tools – are still made by humans and not machines.

“We would condemn humanity to a hopeless future if we removed people’s ability to make decisions about themselves and their lives, condemning them to depend on the choices of machines,” he said. “We must guarantee and safeguard a space of appropriate human control over the choices made by artificial intelligence programs: human dignity itself depends on it.”

The Pope himself has also been the subject of AI-generated mischief. Last year, when images emerged online showing the 86-year-old pontiff atypically wrapped up against the elements in a stylish white puffer jacket and a silver-bejeweled crucifix, they quickly went viral, racking up millions of views across social media platforms. Photos were an artificial intelligence rendering generated with Midjourney AI software.

AI diffusion and migration were two of the main topics discussed by world leaders at the summit. After the session, the pope, in a wheelchair and white robe, met separately with G7 leaders and was greeted with a round of applause, and he spoke with them for about 25 minutes.