Pope Leo XIV told young people at a prayer vigil in Buenos Aires on 10 November that money, success at any cost and popularity are among today’s idols, and that people may lie or humiliate others “on social media” to win approval. The @Pontifex account posted the passage in English at 01:30 UTC on 11 November.
The post reads: “Today idols arise and demand our worship: success at any cost, money, an obsession with appearance, popularity, or the unrestrained pursuit of pleasure”. It had about 300,000 views when we read it on Wednesday morning.
Business Pill · Watermarking
A short general explainer on watermarking, marking AI-generated content so it can be told apart. It does not discuss the Pope, the Vatican or this address.
The key insight: As we read the two texts, the Pope’s vigil warning about seeking approval on social media sits next to a sharper January argument about the business model behind it: engagement-maximising algorithms that are, in his words, profitable for platforms.
The post continues: “Sometimes, in order to win the approval of others, we may go so far as to lie, betray, or humiliate someone on social media. Do not bow down before anything that cannot give you life”. It ends: “Do not allow anything or anyone to take away the freedom God has given you”.
The passage comes from the Pope’s address at the vigil with young people at the Monumento de los Españoles, which the Vatican has published in Spanish. The vigil is part of an apostolic journey to Uruguay, Argentina and Peru, according to the Vatican’s speeches index.
In the Spanish text, the same paragraph continues beyond the post. It says: “Hay tambiรฉn quienes hacen negocio ofreciendo placeres que terminan por esclavizarnos, como la pornografรญa y diversas sustancias”. In our translation: there are also those who make a business of offering pleasures that end up enslaving us, such as pornography and various substances.
Later in the address, he adapted a biblical canticle, inviting modern fields to bless God, including “Ciencia y tecnologรญa, bendecid al Seรฑor. Redes y pantallas, bendecid al Seรฑor”. In our translation: science and technology, bless the Lord; networks and screens, bless the Lord.
Today idols arise and demand our worship: success at any cost, money, an obsession with appearance, popularity, or the unrestrained pursuit of pleasure. Sometimes, in order to win the approval of others, we may go so far as to lie, betray, or humiliate someone on social media. Do not bow down before anything that cannot give you life. And if you have ever fallen, get back up. Do not allow anything or anyone to take away the freedom God has given you. #ApostolicJourney #Argentina
Pope Leo XIV’s @Pontifex account posted at 01:30 UTC on 11 November a passage on today’s idols, naming success at any cost, money, an obsession with appearance, popularity and the unrestrained pursuit of pleasure, and on lying, betraying or humiliating someone on social media. The passage comes from his 10 November vigil address to young people in Buenos Aires, published by the Vatican in Spanish.
His Earlier Message on Platforms and AI
The remarks echo the Pope’s message for the World Day of Social Communications, dated 24 January 2026. In it he wrote that “algorithms designed to maximize engagement on social media โ which is profitable for platforms โ reward quick emotions and penalize more time-consuming human responses”.
The message addresses platform owners directly: for “those at the helm of online platforms”, he wrote, responsibility means “ensuring that their business strategies are not guided solely by the criterion of profit maximization”. It also says that “Content generated or manipulated by AI are to be clearly marked and distinguished from content created by humans”.
He wrote of “significant concerns about the oligopolistic control of algorithmic systems and artificial intelligence”, and called for “media, information and AI literacy” in education systems at all levels. Earlier on this trip, he spoke about AI and work, in our piece on his warning that AI can put jobs at risk.
The Structural Read
As we read the vigil address, it speaks to individuals about their own choices, approval, popularity and appearance, rather than to companies; the Spanish text also names those who make a business of offering pleasures.
As we read the January message, the asks are specific: labelling AI-generated content, platform strategies not driven solely by profit maximisation, regulation against emotional attachment to chatbots, and AI literacy in schools.
Pope Leo XIV, Message for the World Day of Social Communications, 24 January 2026
“Public trust is earned by accuracy and transparency, not by chasing after any kind of possible engagement”
Three Implications
FOR PLATFORMS The January message asks those at the helm of online platforms not to be guided solely by profit maximisation.
FOR AI DEVELOPERS It invites the creators of AI models to practise transparency about design principles and moderation systems, by its account.
FOR SCHOOLS It calls for media, information and AI literacy in education systems at all levels.
What Is Not Established
The vigil address names no company or platform, and it does not mention artificial intelligence. The Vatican had published the vigil text in Spanish and Italian when we checked; the English words here are the @Pontifex post’s, and other English renderings of the Spanish are our translation. The link between the vigil remarks and the January message is our reading of two texts, not a connection the Pope drew in the address.
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At a youth vigil in Buenos Aires on 10 November, Pope Leo XIV named success at any cost, money, appearance, popularity and pleasure as today’s idols and warned against lying or humiliating others on social media to win approval. In January he wrote that engagement-maximising algorithms are “profitable for platforms” and asked platform leaders not to be guided solely by profit maximisation.
A note on sourcing. We read the @Pontifex post and the Vatican’s official Spanish text of the 10 November vigil address in full, and the Vatican’s English text of the Pope’s 2026 World Day of Social Communications message. Spanish passages are quoted in Spanish; English renderings of them are our translation, except the words of the @Pontifex post. The view count is as shown when we read the post.
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.
