VATICAN CITY - "Preserving human voices and faces" is the theme chosen by the Pope for the 60th Vatican Council. World Media Day, which will be celebrated in many countries on Sunday, 17 May 2026, the Feast of the Ascension.
Along with announcing the theme for the 60th World Media Day, the Dicastery for Communication stressed that the future of communication must "ensure that machines are tools in the service and connection of human life, not forces that dilute the human voice." It refers here to technology that "influences interactions in ways we have not known before", with algorithms that "select the content communicated in the news" and artificial intelligence "that creates entire texts and conversations". To be sure, these are "possibilities that were unthinkable just a few years ago", but these tools "cannot replace the exclusively human capacities of empathy, ethics and moral responsibility". Indeed, public communication 'requires human judgement, not just data schemas'.
The challenge, then, is to "ensure that humanity remains the main actor". In addition to the great opportunities, today's communications have real risks, such as the "engaging but misleading, manipulative and harmful content" that AI can generate, reproducing "prejudices and stereotypes", amplifying misinformation and invading people's privacy without their consent. "Excessive dependence on artificial intelligence - the Vatican dicastery stresses - weakens critical thinking and creative abilities, while the monopolistic control of these systems raises fears of centralisation of power and inequality".
Hence the urgent need to introduce 'media literacy' and AI literacy into education systems (MAIL, i.e. Media and Artificial Intelligence Literacy"As Catholics," concludes the Dicastery's press release on communications, "we can and must help people, especially the young, to acquire the ability to think critically and to grow in freedom of spirit."
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