Cultural Update: Pope's Encyclical on AI; Research on Politics in Church; Texas Creates Clinic for De-transitioners

Think Biblically: Conversations on Faith & Culture

Talbot School of Theology at Biola University / Sean McDowell & Scott Rae

Talbot, Church, Christianity, Christian, Culture, Biola, Sean Mcdowell, Religion & Spirituality, Scott Rae, Think Biblically

4.8 • 1.3K Ratings

🗓️ 29 May 2026

⏱️ 59 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

The Pope's New AI Encyclical: The hosts discuss a groundbreaking 250-page encyclical from Pope Leo XIV that explores the intersection of Catholic faith and artificial intelligence. The encyclical calls for AI to serve humanity rather than displace it, emphasizing that our inherent human limitations and vulnerabilities are actually a good design by God. Pew Research on Church Politics: A surprising new poll reveals how much churches actually address political and social issues like abort...

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	The Pope releases an encyclical about AI. A new Pew Research poll reveals how much churches
0:08.0	actually talk about politics, and it might surprise you. And Texas creates the first
0:13.6	gender clinic for D-transitioners. These are the stories we'll discuss, and we'll also address
0:19.6	some of your questions. I'm your host, Sean McDowell. I'm your co-host, Scott Ray. This is the Think Bivocally Weekly Cultural Update brought to by Talbot School Theology, Biola University. Scott, this is one of the weeks where you sent me a story early saying, we got to talk about this AI encyclical, and that is for so many different reasons.
0:39.2	But let me just lay out a few things that happen.
0:41.3	Probably a lot of our listeners are aware that this was released.
0:45.3	But a couple of things before I turn over to you for some context.
0:49.0	This was released kind of in the context of like the Tower of Babel framing what happens when we have new
0:56.2	technology and what damage could potentially be released. The Vatican released a 250 page
1:04.5	encyclical letter translated as the magnificent humanity. It's been hailed as the first official Catholic document to wrestle
1:13.0	with AI. And by the way, you and I have talked about this, Scott. This comes out of some conversations
1:18.1	that the Vatican and Catholic Church has been hosting with experts for years weighing into this.
1:24.6	But rather than deal, according to a lot of the articles, rather than deal strictly with
1:28.0	the hazards of AI, the letter which is signed by Pope Leo the 14th, has two overarching
1:34.9	purposes. First, to defend humanity against those who've grown jaded about our shared
1:40.7	nature and existence. And second, to warn society about the threats posed by the
1:46.2	temptation to outsource human capabilities to computers. Now, there's a ton of questions that are
1:53.8	raised by this. One of the Pope's surprising arguments is his insistence that humanity is fundamentally
1:59.9	good. Now, it doesn't mean morally good,
2:02.9	but really, we're good because we're human and our goodness in stem parts from how we are
2:10.5	distinct from machines. So one of the quotes is, indeed, precisely because we experience
2:17.0	limits, vulnerability, suffering,
	...

Transcript will be available on the free plan in 18 days. Upgrade to see the full transcript now.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Talbot School of Theology at Biola University / Sean McDowell & Scott Rae, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Talbot School of Theology at Biola University / Sean McDowell & Scott Rae and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.