Catholic Herald Weighs AI as 'Serious Tool' Requiring Sober Responsibility

The Catholic Herald has published a substantive analysis framing artificial intelligence not as a demonic force but as a serious tool requiring sober responsibility. The publication's approach cuts through the sensational headlines claiming AI represents a pact with the Devil or the beast from Revelation, instead offering a framework grounded in practical ethics and human dignity.

According to the full article, the Catholic response should avoid both outright denunciation and full-throated endorsement. This middle path acknowledges that if AI is part of the future, fallen human nature will inevitably misuse it. The publication classifies AI as a serious tool by the potential harm it can cause when placed in inexperienced or impaired hands.

The analogy to automobiles and firearms is deliberate. Calculators require virtually no safeguards, while cars demand extensive licensing systems. AI falls somewhere in between, yet the publication notes numerous reports describe harm people have inflicted on themselves and others with chatbots. This is cause for grave concern, though safeguards can and should be put in place.

The body is important, but not all harm is physical. Catholics can recognize the spiritual dangers posed by AI image generation and character simulation. Man's capacity to perceive beauty has long been distorted to serve his lusts. If the internet and its pornography were not enough, he can now abuse his imagination in still more pathetic and lurid ways. Worse still are websites that actively encourage users to surrender themselves to lust and dissipation.

Yet AI presents dangers beyond obvious moral abuses. Even when used for legitimate purposes, it may erode the habits and satisfactions essential to human flourishing. It is no secret that calculators can weaken mental arithmetic and that typing can erode handwriting skills. AI, however, has the potential to remove a far greater degree of intellectual engagement from the user. Tools such as autocorrect and Grammarly are undeniably useful, but the trade-off is real (and frankly, we've been trading cognitive effort for convenience since spellcheck arrived).

Not every struggle is merely burdensome; many struggles are formative. Beyond the atrophy that may result from overreliance on AI, there is also a genuine danger to the satisfaction that comes from doing something oneself. What a person puts into his work is what he gets out of it. Work is essential to man. Through work, he brings order to the chaos of his world in imitation of his Creator. The dignity of work is a gift directly bestowed by God.

The publication does not wish to declare all use of generative AI taboo, but rather to highlight the real exchange we may be making: satisfaction for ease, contemplation for quick answers and hard-earned skills for immediate results. Not every party invitation or email draft must flow from the depths of the heart. Nevertheless, we should take notice of how often we are making these trades.

Part of being human is the ability to recollect – to pause, reflect and act deliberately. Recollection gives us prudence in how and when to use tools. This is where the physical reality of technology matters. When you sit before a screen, fingers hovering over keys, the friction of composition forces engagement. When AI fills that space with instant output, the cognitive muscle atrophies. The sensation of typing each word, the pause to find the right phrase, the satisfaction of completing a thought – these are not inefficiencies to be optimized away.

AI is not demonic. Men are fully capable of creating things that are harmful to themselves. We should learn to take responsibility for our inventions rather than blaming preternatural forces when we abuse them. When we misuse serious tools, we abuse both AI and ourselves.

The diocesan response in practice shows this framework in action. At the Diocese of Arlington, Joe Vorbach, diocesan schools superintendent, formed a 14-person working group of experienced educators to help shape AI policy for the schools. The policy was distributed to schools in June, but Leslie Lipovski, diocesan assistant superintendent of student learning and teaching excellence, said it will be adapted and updated as needed.

Discernment is a big piece of this because we don't want to just begin using AI for everything. There's a way to use AI and that's what the policy is created to help answer. The policy also forms students as ethical leaders in a tech-driven society. Bishop Michael F. Burbidge emphasized that the diocese must take the initiative on AI rather than letting AI give us the policy.

At St. Paul VI Catholic High School in Chantilly, Michael Hargadon developed a program called LUMA, an intelligent classroom assistant along with his son Finn Hargadon and other students. LUMA is designed to integrate seamlessly with Google Classroom to create a responsive, intelligent assistant that supports both students and teachers. It can answer student questions in real time, provide tailored explanations based on the teacher's instructional style, and reference course-specific materials, all while staying true to Catholic identity.

The beta version was completed before classes began this fall. Hargadon's Introduction to AI class (approximately 20 students) will be the first to use and test it as part of their curriculum. If the pilot is successful, it will expand to additional teachers and courses at Paul VI.

Principals who attended the conference already have seen problems with AI. I've run into situations where students have been using AI to find out about things that are a little bit on the dangerous side and could really get them into trouble, said Aránzazu Ascunce, principal of St. Ambrose School in Annandale. Debra Eisel, principal of St. Mary's School in Rockville, Md., said she's concerned about the potential of AI to damage problem-solving skills of students.

We need to give them more unstructured time and teach them how to do things, how to make things. Just give them time to go outside and play and figure things out with their friends because they're not having that opportunity. They're used to instant gratification.

Hargadon acknowledged that AI presents significant challenges, but he's optimistic that the diocesan strategy is sound. I look at AI as being like the Wizard of Oz. Once you find out what's behind the curtain, it's not that scary. We can't stop it. We're going to use it for good and not be afraid of it.

The Vatican's position reinforces this cautious engagement. Pope Leo XIV has warned the Church about the challenges being created by artificial intelligence, biotechnology, and social media. Speaking to the bishops of Italy, the pontiff said such developments, along with the data economy, are profoundly transforming our perception and experience of life.

In this scenario, the dignity of the human being risks being flattened or forgotten, replaced by functions, automatisms, simulations. But the person is not a system of algorithms: He is a creature, a relationship, a mystery.

The message was sent to participants in the AI for Good Summit 2025, organized by the International Telecommunication Union, in partnership with other UN agencies and co-hosted by the Swiss Government. The impact of the AI revolution is far-reaching, transforming areas such as education, work, art, healthcare, governance, the military, and communication.

Whether Catholic institutions can maintain this balance between adoption and discernment remains the real question. The framework exists, the policies are being written, but the daily friction of resisting instant answers while still using the tools will test every educator and student. Whether users actually pay for it remains the real question.

Artūras Malašauskas is an AI Systems Integrator with 20+ years of production-grade web engineering experience. He has designed, shipped, and scaled enterprise Python/PHP systems for logistics, SaaS, and public-sector clients. For the past year, he has focused exclusively on AI integrations: deploying open-source LLMs, building generative media pipelines (image, audio, video), and engineering multi-agent workflows for real production environments. His standard: reproducibility, security, cost-efficient inference—no vaporware. He documents and evaluates emerging AI tooling, separating verified capabilities from marketing noise. Technical editor at: muza-ai.eu, ai-verslas.lt, ai-naujinos.lt Connect on LinkedIn