To understand this first social Encyclical of Pope Leo XIV, Magnifica Humanitas, which principally aims to safeguarding the human person in the age of Artificial Intelligence (AI), it is important to appreciate the title of this epoch-making magisterial document. The title, “Magnifica Humanitas,” is humanistically appealing, philosophically engaging, theologically enlightening, and spiritually reviving. It is a beautiful concept of enormous and satisfying ingredient for the life of both the mind and the soul. The English translation of the word “Magnifica” means extremely attractive, impressive, very beautiful, or exceptionally good. The word “humanitas” in English is “humanity” (to be human). Therefore, Magnifica Humanitas, Magnificent Humanity, acknowledges the truth that we human beings are wonderfully made because we have been made in the image and likeness of God (Genesis 1: 26-27). To be made in the image and likeness of God, Imago Dei and Similacrum Dei, provides the biblical foundation and theological basis for the Church’s teaching on human dignity, which is the first principle of the Catholic Social Teaching. In his introduction to Magnifica Humanitas, Bishop Barron articulated thus: “The irreducible nobility of the human being is, I believe, the master motif of Magnifica Humanitas. In line with his recent predecessors, Pope Leo XIV insists that we human beings are magnificent because we have been made in the image and likeness of God and, even more wonderfully, elevated through the incarnation to a share in divinity itself.”
This dignity does not originate from human achievement, status, or utility. It originates from God. Every human being without exception bears the Imago Dei, the very image and likeness of God. This is not a title we earn; it is a truth we are born with. That dignity begins, therefore, not at birth, but from the womb (Jeremiah 1:5). From the moment of conception, every human life carries an inviolable worth, one that no circumstance, no condition, and no stage of development can diminish or erase. Because this dignity is God’s gift and not man’s invention, it cannot rightly be stripped away by any human authority. What God has given, no human structure, however powerful, is entitled to take back. This is why the human person is sacred, and why questions such as capital punishment and “just war” theory, are being considered outdated by Pope Leo XIV in Magnifica Humanitas (MH, 192). To take a life is to act against a dignity that was never ours to grant and is therefore never ours to remove.
In reading Magnifica Humanitas, we come to realize that the humanism on display in every page of this beautiful treatise is not the oversimplistic secular humanism of the post-Christian world of today, but a humanism rooted in Christ, who is the image of the invisible God (Colossians 1:15). This is what is referred to as true humanism that is fundamentally Christological because Jesus took unto Himself our human nature. The author of the Letter to the Hebrews said, “Jesus was like us in all things but sin (Hebrew 4:15). The Fathers of the Second Vatican Council in the Pastoral Constitution of the Church in Modern World, Gaudium et Spes, delightfully acknowledged, “It is only in the mystery of the Incarnate Word does the mystery of man can take on light” (Gaudium et Spes, 22). Among the Igbo people of Nigeria, the human person is called, “Mmandu,” which is made up of two words: “Mma” meaning “Beauty” and “Ndu”, which means “Life.” Therefore, the human being is referred to as “Beauty of life” which is translated to mean “Life is beautiful,” or “The Human Person is Beautiful.” The Psalmist proclaims that we human beings are wonderfully made (Psalm 139:14). The first seal God printed on each human being after creation is that we are excellent (Genesis 1:31). There were original blessings first (Genesis, chapters 1 and 2), before original sin (Genesis, chapter 3). Therefore, our humanity is a delight to God because He made man little lower than the angels and has crowned him with glory and honor (Psalm 8:5). St. Carlo Acutis (1991-2006), reflecting on the magnificence of the human person, prayerfully observed that, “We are originals and not photocopies.”
This “Magnificent Humanity” is part of what we recite in the Nicaean Creed, which reads, “He was conceived of the Blessed Virgin Mary and became Man.” Furthermore, Magnifica Humanitas constitutes the truth we celebrate in the Sacrament of Baptism. In Baptism, “we die with Christ and rise to new life in Christ.” The human person is ‘Magnificent’ because, through the reception of Holy Communion, we participate in the life of Jesus Christ, who gave His Body and Blood for the life of the world (John 6:51). Through the Sacrament of Penance, our weak human nature is reconciled with God. In the Sacrament of the Anointing of the sick, our body, though weak and vulnerable, is anointed, renewed, and uplifted. In the Sacrament of Holy Orders, a human being is configured to the person of Christ and is called “Alter Christus” (another Christ), who acts in “Persona Christi” (in the person of Christ). The Sacrament of Matrimony is an anticipation of our ultimate union with Christ who is the Bridegroom of the Church (Ephesians 5:21-33). It is also a foretaste of the wedding of the Lamb (Revelation 19: 5-10).
In upholding the truth that the “Church is an expert in humanity” as Pope St. Paul VI articulated during his historic address to the United Nations Organization on October 4, 1965, Pope Leo scholarly and pastorally outlined in chapter two of Magnifica Humanitas how the Church promotes the well-being of all people through her Catholic Social Teaching (CST), sometimes called “Social Doctrine of the Church” (SDC). He observed that the Social Doctrine of the Church is not a spontaneous product of the modern age. Instead, it is the fruit of receiving and structuring a long tradition of ecclesial reflection on life in society, rotted in Sacred Scriptures, the Church Fathers and the theological and legal developments of the Middle Ages and modern era (MH, 29). To highlight the benefits of the seven principles of the Catholic Social Teaching, Pope Leo XIV dutifully made reference to Pope Leo XIII’s groundbreaking Encyclical Rerum Novarum, which was published on May 15, 1891. Magnifica Humanitas celebrates the 135th anniversary of Rerum Novarum (new things). Pope Leo XIV argued that just as Pope Leo XIII needed to confront the “new things” of his time, which included workers’ rights, rise in industrialization and evils of secularism, the present Pontiff, Pope Leo XIV, is determined to use the message of the Gospel, the teachings of St. Augustine, and human experience (Gaudium et Spes, 16) to evangelically and courageously engage the “new things” of today, especially AI, Robotics, and other forms of advanced technology. These “new things” of the 21st Century tend to have a Tower of Babel quality (Genesis 11: 1-9) a tendency toward manipulation, domination, and the reduction of all forms of communication to a singular digital language. On a positive note, the Holy Father observed that if we employ the spirit of Nehemiah and his community (Nehemiah 2-6) in welcoming these technological marvels of our time and age, they may become instruments to enhance human flourishing and the good of our communities.
In our next conversation, we shall outline the seven principles of Catholic Social Teaching. We shall study how they can help us to imbibe the “Nehemiah” framework in our use of the “new things” that have inexorably found their “nest” in our homes, families, institutions, and social contexts.
Ad majorem Dei gloriam
Very Rev. Benedict Nwachukwu-Udaku is the Director of Academic Formation at St. Junipero Serra House of Formation and the Vicar for Priests in the Diocese of San Bernardino.