Pope Leo XIV told a Catholic university in Chiclayo, Peru, on 13 November that the promises of transhumanism, that “technology will eliminate all disease and pain, as well as aging and even death itself”, amount to a “mirage”. The Pope’s post on X carrying the passage, published at 02:10 UTC on 14 November, showed 680,688 views at 07:55 UTC.
The passage was one of three paragraphs on technology in the address. By our count those three paragraphs make up 349 of the 1,382 words of the Spanish text, about 25%.
Business Pill · Concentration
A short explainer on concentration: what happens when gains gather in a few hands. It teaches the general idea only and does not discuss the Pope or the address.
The key insight: As we read it, the address puts a moral test on the promise behind life-extension technology: the passage does not reject science, which it calls “a supreme achievement of human intelligence”, but objects to its benefits becoming “a privilege reserved for millionaires seeking immortality”.
The English text posted on X says that “scientific progress is a supreme achievement of human intelligence” and that “it must not be confused with a privilege reserved for millionaires seeking immortality, while entire peoples suffer from poverty and oppression”.
It describes “the illusion of human beings perfected by cybernetics and biotechnology” and closes: “a limitation is not a manufacturing defect, but rather the very condition of human grandeur”.
The post links to the Vatican event page for the meeting with the academic community at the Catholic University “Santo Toribio de Mogrovejo”, scheduled for 5:45 p.m. local time, which is 22:45 UTC. The Pope served as the university’s grand chancellor, according to the address.
Words in the Spanish text of Pope Leo XIV’s address in Chiclayo on 13 November 2026, split into the three paragraphs that discuss technology and the rest. The word counts and topic split are our count.
What Was Posted on X
Today, the promises of transhumanism and posthumanism are multiplying. These are ideological currents according to which, sooner or later, technology will eliminate all disease and pain, as well as aging and even death itself. Precisely because scientific progress is a supreme achievement of human intelligence, it must not be confused with a privilege reserved for millionaires seeking immortality, while entire peoples suffer from poverty and oppression. In the face of this mirage, which promotes the illusion of human beings perfected by cybernetics and biotechnology, Christian anthropology reminds us that a limitation is not a manufacturing defect, but rather the very condition of human grandeur. #ApostolicJourney #Peru #MagnificaHumanitas https://www.vatican.va/content/leo-xiv/en/events/event.dir.html/content/vaticanevents/en/2026/11/13/peru-mondo-unversitario.html
Pope Leo XIV’s own account posted this English passage from his 13 November address in Chiclayo at 02:10 UTC on 14 November; the piece quotes it verbatim.
The Fuller Address
The full text on Vatican.va is in Spanish; the English page carried no body text when we read it at 07:50 UTC. In the original, the passage reads that “el límite no es un defecto de fábrica, sino la condición de la grandeza humana”.
Two earlier paragraphs deal with technology directly. One says “La tecnología, queridos amigos, no siempre es neutra”, meaning technology is not always neutral, and that its forms can carry the interests of “quien la proyecta y la controla”, whoever designs and controls it.
The other calls “la sumisión al paradigma tecnocrático”, submission to the technocratic paradigm, the most lethal risk, and asks students to seek the wisdom that “ni las máquinas ni los programas informáticos pueden tener”, which neither machines nor software can have. Our piece on the Argentina leg covered the Pope’s remarks on AI and jobs earlier on the same trip.
The Business Backdrop
The address names no company, investor or product. As we read it, the passage speaks to the promise behind longevity and AI-biotech investing, that cybernetics and biotechnology can extend human life. Our coverage of AI in drug development, such as Anthropic’s purchase of a drug startup, tracks the commercial side of that pitch.
The Structural Read
As we read the full Spanish text, the passage on transhumanism sits beside two others on technology, which by our count take 349 of the address’s 1,382 words.
As we read it, the address speaks to who gets access to the gains of science; it names no company, investor or product, and we link it to none.
Pope Leo XIV, post on X, 14 November 2026
“a limitation is not a manufacturing defect, but rather the very condition of human grandeur”
Three Implications
FOR FOUNDERS AND INVESTORS IN LIFE-EXTENSION The address frames the issue as one of access, saying progress must not be confused with a privilege reserved for millionaires seeking immortality.
FOR UNIVERSITIES The address asks academics and students to seek the wisdom that, in its words in Spanish, ni las máquinas ni los programas informáticos pueden tener.
FOR READERS FOLLOWING THE TRIP Our piece on the Argentina leg covered the Pope’s remarks on AI and jobs.
The framework records: “The AI Supercycle is ultimately an attempt to understand the thread connecting these forces and how, together, they shape the next era of human development.”
As we read it, the Chiclayo address is one public voice on that question of direction. The framework does not discuss the Vatican or the address.
Words in each of the three technology paragraphs of the Spanish text of the address; counts and labels are ours.
What Is Not Established
The translations of the Spanish quotations above are ours; the Vatican had not posted an English text of the full address when we checked. The view count is X’s own counter at one moment and is not audited.
The address does not say which people or companies the Pope had in mind, and we do not attribute the remarks to any.
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Pope Leo XIV called the transhumanist promise to end disease, aging and death a mirage, and said scientific progress must not become a privilege for millionaires seeking immortality. Technology took about a quarter of the Chiclayo address by our count, and the X post carrying the passage passed 680,000 views within six hours.
A note on sourcing. The English quotations come from the Pope’s post on X of 14 November; the Spanish quotations come from the full text of the address on Vatican.va, read on 14 November, and their English renderings are ours. The word counts and the view-count reading are our own. The Vatican was not contacted for this piece.
Gennaro Cuofano is a CRO and tech executive who has worked in AI since late 2015, starting with bringing NLP, natural-language generation, voice and chatbot products to the marketing industry. His background is in law and finance: he holds a Master's degree in Law and an International MBA with an emphasis on corporate finance (LUISS Business School and the University of San Diego, 2012), and worked as a financial analyst at a real-estate investment firm in San Diego and as an assistant controller. His work focuses on business model strategy, business engineering and, more broadly, structural analysis: how companies make money, read from their own filings. He created FourWeekMBA and leads research there and at The Business Engineer, his newsletter on AI and business strategy, with over 95,000 subscribers and more than 1,000 published analyses. His writing has also appeared on Entrepreneur (for example, How to Digitize a Family Business in Europe) and HackerNoon. Find him on LinkedIn and Substack. See how we source.
