On the plane on Monday, the pope said the warnings were not “fake news, as some have said, to try and cause whether financial or some other kind of benefit”.
“This is a problem that I think we need to sit down and talk about,” he said, adding: “To simply say ‘Oh, it’s not going to happen’ and close our eyes to it, I think is probably not the most responsible way to go about that.”
The Vatican has in recent months stepped up its rhetoric and initiatives in support of international AI governance, particularly in the fields of nuclear technology, culture and artistic creation.
“DEEPLY WOUNDED”
The visit was particularly closely watched for the relatively new pope’s comments on the wave of abuse scandals that has swept the Catholic Church.
After a meeting with abuse victims in France, the pope said several of them had spoken to him “about systemic abuse in the Church”.
“Personally, I prefer to express it in a different way, although I did speak about some organisations within the church who have at times, if you will, as a system, been abusive.”
The pope said that abuse within the Church also meant that “people’s lives of faith are deeply wounded and sometimes even destroyed.
“So there’s a particular responsibility of the church to walk with them and to help them seek healing,” he said.
Asked about his stance on assisted dying, the pope said that the Church was “not entering into politics”.
He said the Church wanted to be close to people “in the midst of sickness or disability or pain” and “to affirm the values that life itself I think holds for all of us”.
“So I would say if that’s politics, I did that, but it was not to get involved in French politics,” he said.
