Trinity Sunday – 31 May 2026
On first glance, the connection between theology and technology might seem very slim indeed. What link could the mystery of the Trinity which we celebrate this Sunday possibly have with the rapid rise of new technologies, such as Artificial Intelligence?
It is rather remarkable, however, that in this last week leading to our celebration of Trinity Sunday this year, Pope Leo has released his first encyclical, Magnifica Humanitas: On Safeguarding the Human Person in the Time of Artificial Intelligence. Just as, in May 1891, Pope Leo XIII saw in the industrial revolution an unmistakable turning point for humanity and published his encyclical Rerum Novarum, “Of New Things”, so now Pope Leo XIV sees ourselves, in our own time, at a similar milestone of development. For Pope Leo, now, in the face of the developments of our own time, the choice is not between a ‘yes’ or ‘no’ to technology but rather between what he terms constructing Babel or re-building Jerusalem (n. 9). He uses these two stories from the Old Testament to signify the choice we have today. What he calls the “Babel syndrome” – drawing from the Old Testament story of how people sought to construct a tower that reached heaven – idolizes “profit that sacrifices the weak, a uniformity that neutralizes differences, and the pretence that a single language – even a digital one – can translate everything, including the mystery of the human person, into data and performance.” (n.10). And Pope Leo contrasts this with what he calls the “way of Nehemiah.” Nehemiah was the prophet in the Old Testament who rebuilt the Temple in Jerusalem, not through force, but by engaging the people’s fullest participation. (n.8, 10). This, for the Pope, is the real invitation for today: the possibility of building together, “of transforming diversity into a resource and of making listening and dialogue the common ground upon which to cultivate justice and fraternity.” (n.10)
And yet at the very heart of this project is our understanding of the human person. The Pope’s encyclical, in fact, is not fundamentally about technology, but rather about who we are as persons. Artificial intelligence is his immediate context, but the deeper concern the Pope has is whether we will remember who we are. And who we are as persons is known ultimately through our understanding of who God is, in whose image we are made. It is this that makes todays Feast of the Trinity so important. As Christians we dare to affirm that God is a divine community of persons, made one in their love and self-giving to each other. Because God is Triune – Father, Son, and Holy Spirit existing eternally in self-giving love – we bear this dynamism of relationship within our own being. It means that we are made for relationship, that we exist in relationship or not at all, that we find who we are only through relationships, and that we can only come to our fulfillment in and through relationships. Communion is our origin and it is our destiny. It’s not that we exist and then enter relationships. We are our relationships. This is our truth. It is our truth because it is the very truth of God in whose image we are made. (see nn.49-50)
Therefore, the Trinity, the mystery we celebrate this Sunday, is the primary answer to the question of technology. For it is from this mystery that we must navigate our way into the extraordinary possibilities afforded us by technology. That pathway must always have the human person in their integrity front and centre. This is the challenge Pope Leo puts before us. Before the exciting possibilities before us, “we cannot condone naïve enthusiasms nor fuel unfounded fears” as the Pope writes. (n.14). And yet we must resist any tendency to reduce the human person to consumers, data points, or programmable intelligences. Personhood can never be reduced to information processing. Rather, because of the very nature of personhood, genuine wisdom can only arise from embodiment, relationships, suffering, memory, love and moral responsibility. If the Christian understanding of the person is lost freedom becomes algorithmic manipulation, truth becomes information management, relationships become digital simulations, vulnerability becomes a defect, ageing becomes failure and our human worth becomes conditional upon performance. (see nn.49-53, 129). The Pope writes, “I consider particularly insidious the [ideology] that suggests that every person must earn or justify his or own worth, to the point of attributing greater value to those who are more efficient or effective.” (n. 51)
Our dignity then comes from who we are made in the image of God, not by what we do. Indeed, as Pope Leo goes on to write, “No sin, failure, humiliation or exclusion can diminish the profound value of a human life that God has willed and called into being.” (n. 52). This is the challenge of the “pervasive technocratic paradigm in which we are immersed” There, “the fullness of life is equated with having more, reducing weakness, eliminating uncertainty and exerting total control.” (n.112). And yet, from our Christian understanding, “the quality of a civilisation is measured,” as the Pope writes, “not by the power of its means, but by the care it is able to offer. The ability to care for one another is a fundamental dimension of our humanity, one that is learned and mastered through lived experience. Reading stories to a child, offering company to an elderly person and arranging a home so that it is welcoming . . .” (n.114). These are the things that make us human. And as he goes on to write, “Those who love and desire cannot avoid passing through trial and suffering; and over the years, we carry within us lessons that leave their mark like scars, the memories of a journey shaped by freedom and failure, dreams and disappointments. It is only through the interplay of these elements that the wonders of the soul occur within us, allowing us to sense the richness of our humanity.” (n.120). Turning to the ancient Greek philosopher, Plato, the Pope reminds us that “the deepest and most important things are learned only much time and effort, by engaging in discussion with others, ‘striking upon’ ideas and experiences together like flint until the spark of understanding is kindled within us.” (n.140)
How then do we remember this truth of ourselves before the rise of the new technologies? Above all, by remembering in whose image we are made: the Triune God. This is why today’s feast is so important. But then by translating our very understanding of God into all those ways that seek to strengthen our relationships in both family and community, and which allow for the possibility of genuine encounter, risky and as messy as it can be at times. It means not being afraid of our vulnerability but encountering this, in particular, as the place through which we discover who we truly are. And it means allowing ourselves the time for silence, for genuine rest, and for the solitude of prayer through which we can re-centre ourselves.
Pope Leo has given us the most significant gift in last week’s encyclical. I encourage us to read it, to study it, to take it to heart. The future of our world will depend on whether we can learn its lessons.
