a time when many of us have only the vaguest ideas about Artificial Intelligence and yet are aware that AI is poised to change our lives dramatically, Leo Ocampo and Ivan Gozum have done the great service of giving us this valuable primer on AI and the Catholic Church. Meticulously researched, comprehensive in its discussion of areas of human life and culture that will feel the impact of AI, even-handed in its presentation of threats and possibilities, lucid whether discussing technology or theology, the book illumines and challenges. In the best of the Dominican tradition, without fear or blind enthusiasm, but with realistic hope, the authors provide an agenda for the social mission of the Church of our time: to discern ways to ensure that AI, in its design, use, and management, serves human dignity and agency, truth, and the common good of all peoples.

This text offers a timely and well-informed introduction to artificial intelligence. It systematically examines both the challenges and the creative opportunities AI presents for the economy and education, while also addressing fundamental questions concerning truth, justice, human dignity, and hope. The Catholic perspectives on technology articulated here provide conceptual and practical frameworks for Catholic communities to reflect upon and respond to rapid digital developments, and they will also be of interest to scholars and practitioners concerned with the social and ethical responsibilities of institutions.

This book is, above all, a serious and timely effort to place Catholic reflection at the heart of one of the most disruptive phenomena of our time: artificial intelligence. One of the main merits of the text is its broad and pedagogical structure. The chapters address economics and justice, truth and discernment, ethics and responsibility, evangelization, education, health, ecology, and finally digital discernment and hope. This thematic architecture allows the book to avoid being reduced to an abstract moral treatise and instead to engage in dialogue with concrete areas of ecclesial and social life. Rather than offering definitive answers, the book opens a conversation.

Alonso de Llanes, PhD

Director, Laudato Si’ Action Platform Dicastery for Integral Human Development

Authored by two young scholars in the field of theology, this book, Artificial Intelligence and the Catholic Church: Challenges, Discernment and Hope in a Digital Age, offers an insightful exploration of this technological development through the lens of the Catholic Church's social teachings. The book is inspired by the realiztion that artificial intelligence technology now permeates the fabric of our lives and significantly reshapes human society.