Executive Summary

As institutions and communities wrestle with the opportunities and risks of AI, Pope Leo's 2026 encyclical Magnifica Humanitas offers a framework for ethical discernment centered on the common good.

This white paper introduces five ethical standards highlighted by Pope Leo:

1. Human Dignity

2. Universal Destination of Goods

3. Preferential Option for the Poor

4. Care for Our Common Home

5. Justice and Peace

Together, these standards provide a framework for evaluating whether AI technologies promote human flourishing or deepen patterns of exclusion, exploitation, environmental harm, and conflict.

This goal of this report is to invite policymakers, educators, students, faith communities, industry leaders, and all people of good will into a broader public conversation about the future of technology and the common good.

Introduction

In his 2026 letter, “Magnifica Humanitas,” Pope Leo points the way towards an ethical future of technological development. His argument focuses on the building of the common good, which requires that as a human community, we work together for the good of all people. This report unpacks Pope Leo’s approach to AI by focusing on five ethical positions that he calls the “standards” for the common good.

“Let us establish standards for discernment — the dignity of the human person, the universal destination of goods, the preferential option for the poor, care for our common home and peace — and let us translate these standards into practices such as responsible planning, the assessment of human and social impact, the inclusion of the most vulnerable, the promotion of digital literacy and guiding research and industry toward justice and peace.” Magnifica Humanitas, 14

These standards represent the core of Catholic Social Doctrine both for Pope Leo and for us at the Grefenstette Center for Ethics at Duquesne University. In the months and years to come, we will publish reports that use these standards to analyze major ethical issues surrounding AI like data centers, sustainability, deepfakes, education, labor, and many more.

We will invite collaborators from academic, student, and community settings about how to apply these five ethical standards to real-life issues around AI facing us today. In other words, these reports will be part of building the common good together.

This introductory report will unpack Pope Leo’s standards, present several major ethical issues around AI, and reveal critical questions these ethical standards now lead us to consider.

What is the Common Good?

The common good is not “the most good for the most people,” better known as utilitarianism. The common good actively seeks to include all people, especially the most vulnerable, in creating conditions for a greater good that can be shared by all. According to Pope Leo, the tenets of the common good involve doctrines like subsidiarity, solidarity, and social justice, all which emphasize the interdependence of humanity. These doctrines also encourage interaction and mutual influence that connect various actions, initiatives, efforts, and decisions.

“The common good is not the sum total of individual benefits, nor the intersection of their particular interests; it is a greater good that belongs to everyone, and it can only be achieved, nurtured and protected by our collective efforts. We can say that social action reaches its fullness when it is directed toward this good, just as a person’s moral action finds its fulfillment in the choice of the true good.” Magnifica Humanitas, 60

“If we were to add up the individual goods,” Pope Leo writes, that would still not explain the existence of the benefit of the common good “that transcends them and, at the same time, enriches them.” (61) To build the common good, we must have a firm relationship with God, accept the limits of humanity, acknowledge a shared responsibility, and actively discuss and implement the following “standards for discernment” around the globe:

1. Equal Dignity of All People

2. Universal Destination of Goods

3. Preferential Option for the Poor

4. Care for our Common Home

5. Justice and Peace

The rest of the report will dive into what these standards mean, how they help build the common good, and interrogate how they interact with AI.

1. The Equal Dignity of All Humans

We first build on the common good by recognizing that all humans have equal dignity, no matter what.

Why this Principle Matters

The long history of Catholic Social Doctrine establishes that all human persons, regardless of earned or unearned recognition, achievement, or merit is of infinite, inviolable worth, simply on the basis of being a human being made in the image of God. Human rights are universal, inalienable, and “have practical consequences and legal effects.” Those that proclaim human rights are hypocritical if “everything were not done to ensure the duty of respecting them, respect by all, in all places and for all.”

Pope Leo's Vision

“The value of persons does not depend on what they achieve or produce. There are rights that apply to everyone simply by virtue of being human, and no human power can legitimately deny or arbitrarily limit them….The fundamental dignity of each person is neither acquired nor earned, nor does it need to be justified.” Magnifica Humanitas, 51-53

Questions for Public Discernment of AI Models

• Is AI increasing the dignity of all people, or just some?

• What aspects of AI increase individual dignity, and what aspects destroy human dignity?

• Does this AI system respect the inherent dignity of every person?

• How might it diminish dignity for vulnerable populations?

• What would it mean for a world of AI that affirms the equal dignity of all people?

• Does it empower human judgment or replace it?

2. The Universal Destination of Goods

Second, we build the common good by affirming that the earth is a gift to be shared by all.

Why This Principle Matters

In the shadow of a modern world full of inequalities and injustices, the universal destination of goods teaches that the earth does not offer commodities to be earned but gifts to be shared by all people. This standard works together with the standard for equal dignity because the earth’s gifts are for all people, and without question, all people deserve a full, dignified life.

Pope Leo's Vision

“The earth’s goods — soil, water, air and natural resources — are given by God to the entire human family to sustain the lives of all, and that every person has an inherent right to the use of such goods, both now and in the future.” Magnifica Humanitas, 65

Questions for Public Discernment of AI Models

• Is AI contributing to the concentration of wealth in the world?

• Can it help all people share in things like food, water, clothing, and medicine?

• How could AI help deliver goods to all people around the world?

• What are the goods of the world and what would it look like to share them fairly?

• How is AI making the problem worse? How is it making them better?

3. The Preferential Option for the Poor

We build the common good by having a special focus on society's most vulnerable citizens.

Why This Principle Matters

As we affirm all people have equal dignity and the earth is a shared gift, we must also acknowledge that God calls us to focus on those frequently disenfranchised and cast aside. We call this “God’s preferential option for the poor” because throughout the Bible, God consistently takes care of those who are sick, outcast, orphaned, and disregarded. It is often society’s most vulnerable that shoulder the negative effects of technological advancement. This third standard builds the common good because even when people affirm dignity and share resources, we often remain within our preferred communities, forgetting others who need them the most.

Pope Leo's Vision

“The Eucharist opens us to justice and sharing, with a preferential concern for those who are burdened by poverty or marginalization. And while new economic and technological networks can generate exclusion, isolation and dependencies, the Church, nourished by the Eucharist, is called to make visible a different paradigm, one that preserves human connections, gives a voice to the invisible and ensures that processes are aimed at respecting people’s dignity.” Magnifica Humanitas, 235

Questions for Public Discernment of AI Models

• Are there ways in which AI helps the already disenfranchised in society?

• How might AI help those that are sick, dying, in poverty, undervalued, or in prison?

• Is AI widening or narrowing the gap between wealth and poverty?

• What would it look like for an AI system that has a “preferential option for the poor”?

4. Care for the Earth, Our Common Home

We build the common good by caring for the earth and building a sustainable future for all.

Why This Principle Matters

For Pope Leo, this fourth standard places all previous ones in a new light: the earth, our common home, offers gifts to be shared by all, through the equal dignity of all humans, especially the most vulnerable. God created the earth with love, and it is our duty to care for all its creatures, simply because they are loved by God. Pope Leo borrows deeply from the groundbreaking ecological letter written by Pope Francis, Laudato Si’. Pope Francis emphasized time and again that the earth is our common home and we are deeply interconnected with all creatures on the earth. Our relationship with God is intertwined not only with our relationship to other humans, but also with our relationship to the non-human web of life around us. Due to this shared responsibility, the neglect of the earth leads to neglect of ourselves and our fellow humans.

Pope Leo's Vision

“Our task today is not only ethical or technical. It is ecological in the deepest sense, for it concerns a new dimension of our common home. AI is already an environment in which we are immersed, as well as a force with which we must engage. For this reason, merely regulating it is insufficient; it must be disarmed, welcoming and accessible.” Magnifica Humanitas, 110

Questions for Public Discernment of AI Models

• How is AI affecting the non-human community of living beings?

• How is AI being used today to make the environmental situation worse?

• What is the impact of data centers and mining practices on pollution, public health, and climate change?

• How might AI be used to create a sustainable, more flourishing future?

5. Justice and Peace

Fifth, we build the common good by working for justice and peace around the world.

Why This Principle Matters

Pope Leo’s fifth and final standard for achieving the common good brings to the forefront the interconnectedness of the technological industry with the political powers of the world. In response to a world in which military might, power, and technological advancement are often wedded for the benefit of some rather than all people, Pope Leo’s fifth principle calls us to develop a moral maturity that links justice and peace together. Peace cannot be understood as the mere absence of war! The principles of human dignity and the common good call for peace to entail the removal of injustice and the creation of “a more dignified life for all” (35). In the words of St. Oscar Romero, “Peace is not the silent result of violent repression. Peace is the generous, tranquil contribution of all to the good of all.”

Pope Leo's Vision

“In an increasingly interdependent world, peace is not simply one issue among others, but a prerequisite for the universal common good and a test of the moral maturity of peoples, especially of those who bear responsibility for governing.” Magnifica Humanitas, 182

Questions for Public Discernment of AI Models

• How can AI help bring peace and justice into the world?

• What aspects of AI are contributing to a world of war?

• How are companies and governments using AI for warfare, and how can we promote AI’s use for peace and justice in the world?

• What would a consideration of military use mean for consideration of a data center?

• Would a community feel differently about data centers based upon their proposed use?

Conclusion

Where Do We Go From Here?

These ethical standards form the moral core of Catholic Social Doctrine, and can offer us deeply impactful ethical footholds for the future of AI. We recommend all people read Magnifica Humanitas in its entirety, as there is much wisdom to be gained in the entirety of the document. Following Pope Leo’s We look forward to working with all members of our campus, regional, online, and global communities to enter into “shared discernment” about how to apply these ethical standards to real-life issues surrounding AI today.

We are living through a rapid phase of transition, a “change of era,” in which…most people are watching and waiting, observing from afar and merely hoping for the best.

For this very reason, crucial questions impose themselves on our conscience and can no longer be avoided: Where are we going? Toward what goal do we wish to orient ourselves? What direction should we choose as a people and as a human community?

We look forward to building the common good together.

This report was supported and reviewed by the staff, students, and faculty of the Mosaic Storytelling Lab of the Carl G. Grefenstette Center for Ethics in Science, Technology, and Law at Duquesne University.

Principal Authors: John P. Slattery, PhD, Executive Director, Grefenstette Center for Ethics

Timothy Frazier, Postdoctoral Teaching and Research Fellow, Grefenstette Center for Ethics

First published on the Feast of All Souls, November 2, 2026.

Copyright © 2026, Duquesne University