Angelicum + CatholicTech co-sponsor Conference on AI and the the Common Good

As Pope Leo XIV laid out his vision for the papacy in his inaugural address to the College of Cardinals, he also revealed why he chose the name “Leo”—and artificial intelligence played a central role. “I chose to take the name Leo XIV,” he said, “mainly because Pope Leo XIII, in his historic Encyclical Rerum Novarum, addressed the social question in the context of the first great industrial revolution. In our own day, the Church offers to everyone the treasury of her social teaching in response to another industrial revolution and to developments in the field of artificial intelligence that pose new challenges for the defense of human dignity, justice, and labor.”

His words resonate powerfully today. Cultural and technological revolutions continue to reshape our world, and even the most established institutions are being called to respond. Last week, the Catholic Institute of Technology partnered with the Angelicum to sponsor a conference addressing this rapidly evolving frontier.

The event, held Wednesday at the Angelicum, featured talks from leading scientists and scholars, including a breakout session led by CatholicTech co-founder Alexis Haughey and Professor Victor Luchangco. While many of the conference sessions focused on the philosophical or theological implications of artificial intelligence—Victor and Alexis’ explored the underlying technology and the ethical dilemmas that emerge from it.

They began by clarifying what artificial intelligence really is: a collection of computer algorithms designed to mimic human cognitive abilities, such as learning, reasoning, perception, and language understanding. From there, they discussed the most common form of modern artificial intelligence—machine learning—which underpins most of today’s emerging “AI” technologies. These are systems that improve their performance on a task over time by analyzing data, without being explicitly programmed for each specific outcome. One example discussed was OpenAI’s GPT model series, which can solve math problems, write essays, and generate code without having been purpose-built for any one of those functions.

The session concluded with a discussion of the ethical implications of machine learning—especially the large-scale data harvesting required to train these models. Alexis and Victor emphasized that sound ethical discernment in this space depends on technical understanding. In order to make informed decisions about what data should or should not be used, one must understand how that data is collected, processed, and utilized. Questions of copyright, confidentiality, and algorithmic bias cannot be responsibly addressed apart from the underlying technology.

Other sessions included “AI and Contemporary Culture” by Professor Gabor Ambrus and “How Can AI Conserve the Common Good Through Business?” by Professor Alejo Sisson. These talks demonstrated how AI’s impact extends across every domain of human life—from economics and education to the arts and daily work.

The AI revolution directly relates to CatholicTech’s mission. We live in a time of constant and accelerating change, where longstanding institutions are questioned and foundational truths often contested. As Catholics, we affirm the unchanging realities of human nature and divine law. But the world in which those truths must be proclaimed is changing rapidly. That is why the Church must both guard the deposit of faith and equip her institutions to meet new challenges with clarity and competence. To teach, we must first learn. Wednesday’s conference was but a first step towards CatholicTech’s mission—bringing scientists, technologists, and philosophers together, under the guidance of the Church, to inform and support her mission.