Kim Daniels
Director of Georgetown University's Initiative on Catholic Social Thought and Public Life, adjunct professor in Georgetown's Department of Theology and Religious Studies, and former Vatican Dicastery for Communication member whose public work connects Catholic social teaching, human dignity, digital culture, and artificial intelligence.
Pope Leo XIV Frames AI Governance as a Test of Human Dignity
Pope Leo XIV’s first encyclical, Magnifica Humanitas, argues that artificial intelligence should be judged first by its effects on human dignity, agency and power, not by its technical promise. In a panel moderated by Vivian Schiller, Vilas Dhar, Kim Daniels and Josh Good read the document as an effort to bring Catholic social teaching into AI debates over work, education, autonomous weapons, institutional accountability and the moral limits of markets and technology.
Pope Leo XIV’s AI Encyclical Ties Safety Rules to Human Dignity
A panel convened by Aspen Digital treated Pope Leo XIV’s first encyclical, Magnificent Humanity, as an authoritative Catholic intervention in AI governance rather than a narrowly theological text. Kim Daniels, Vilas Dhar, and Josh Good argued that the document judges AI by its effects on human dignity, especially for workers, students, creative professionals, and vulnerable communities, while pointing to safety regulation, retraining, and education as practical tests. The unresolved problem, Daniels said, is whether the Church can move that teaching from Rome into parishes, civic institutions, classrooms, and technology work.