By Amer Youhanna
In the previous reflection, I explored Pope Leo XIV’s concern that technological progress should never come at the expense of conscience and moral responsibility. The final part of this reflection considers how these same concerns shape our understanding of work, justice, peace, and the common good.
Work, Economy and Responsibility
The encyclical addresses concerns already shaping many lives. Job insecurity, workplace disruption, and economic uncertainty are not distant possibilities but present reality.
This raises a practical question: what can the Church do?
Part of the answer lies within the Church’s own institutions: schools, hospitals, aged care services, and social agencies. At their best, they embody a vision centred on care rather than efficiency and on human dignity rather than profit.
Pope Leo also invites us to question the assumptions shaping economic life itself.
Technological development is often measured by productivity and growth, yet these measures alone cannot tell us whether people are flourishing.
Indicators such as Gross Domestic Product (GDP) provide useful information, but they do not tell the whole story. A society may become wealthier while also becoming more divided, isolated, or inattentive to the vulnerable.
Progress worthy of the human person must include human development, environmental responsibility, and shared wellbeing.
A multidimensional human society requires a multidimensional measure of success
If human beings are more than producers and consumers, then our understanding of progress must extend beyond economic output to include dignity, justice, relationships, environmental stewardship, and the common good.
As Pope Leo reminds us, “the thinking behind these choices is the immeasurable dignity of every person, the common good and a world truly governed for everyone” (Magnifica Humanitas, n. 164).
How we measure success shapes the decisions we make, the priorities we pursue, and ultimately the kind of society we become.
Peace as the Fruit of Justice
One of the most important insights of Magnifica Humanitas concerns the nature of peace.
If peace is understood merely as the absence of war, it can easily become a commodity, something to be negotiated, traded, purchased, or secured through power alone.
In such a framework, maintaining stability becomes the highest goal, even when the deeper causes of conflict remain untouched.
Where there is no shared commitment to peace, an arms race can appear to be the only realistic way of preventing war. Yet such stability is fragile, for it rests more on fear than on trust. Pope Leo warns of a “revival of war as an instrument of international politics” (Magnifica Humanitas, n. 190). When peace is reduced to deterrence alone, the moral limits that once restrained conflict can gradually be eroded.
Pope Leo proposes a different path:
“Prosperity contributes to building and reinforcing peace only if it is widespread, inclusive and sustainable” (Magnifica Humanitas, n. 165).
Peace cannot be reduced to a commodity. It is the fruit of justice, a shared commitment to the common good, and the hard work of building right relationships.
Perhaps this helps explain why Jesus blesses the peacemakers (Mt 5:9). Peace is not passive. It requires a willingness to address the causes of conflict rather than merely manage their consequences.
Justice and peace are two sides of the same coin. This is why peacemaking demands attention to inequality, exclusion, exploitation, and every situation in which human dignity is neglected. Peacemaking is never someone else’s responsibility. It belongs to all of us.
The Future We Are Building
Throughout Magnifica Humanitas, Pope Leo repeatedly returns to a single concern: the human person.
The challenge of artificial intelligence is therefore not merely technological but moral and spiritual. What matters most is not what our technologies make possible, but the kind of people and communities they are forming.
Conclusion
Ultimately, Magnifica Humanitas is not simply about artificial intelligence. It is a reflection on the human heart.
Its vision is beautifully echoed in Mary’s response to God in the Magnificat, where the proud are scattered, the mighty cast down, and the lowly lifted up (Luke 1:51–52). At the heart of Mary’s song is a profound trust that God’s justice is stronger than human power and that true greatness is found in openness to God’s grace.
Magnifica Humanitas is not a warning against technological progress. Rather, it invites us to reflect on a deeper question: not simply what we are building, but who we are becoming in the process.
In an age increasingly fascinated by what humanity can achieve, Mary reminds us that wisdom begins with humility, that progress must remain at the service of the human person, and that authentic human flourishing is rooted in our relationship with God and one another.
At a time when humanity holds unprecedented technological power, her witness invites us to look beyond what is possible and ask what is good, what is just, and what truly serves the dignity of the human person.
The challenge before us is this: are we still capable of remaining human?