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Chess, the Broadway musical revival, will close June 21, three months earlier than expected and the final performance of star Lea Michele. The show, which also stars Aaron Tveit and Nicholas Christopher, had been expected to sell tickets through at least September 13 with singer-songwriter Joanna “JoJo” Levesque having been announced as a replacement for […]

Frank Lampard is named the League Managers Association manager of the year after guiding Coventry back to the Premier League.

Israel says it was targeting a Hamas commander whose predecessor was killed in a similar strike earlier in May.

’90 Day Fiancé’ star Kim Menzies may still be recovering from finding out son Jamal hooked up with her bestie and fellow castmate Liz Woods … but looks like he’s already got another familiar face in his orbit. TMZ obtained these pics of Jamal…

A fierce battle is underway to shape public perceptions of a deal to end the war in Iran — even though no such agreement has been arrived at and progress toward it was called into question by fresh U.S. attacks on southern Iran on Monday. Despite those strikes, serious negotiations are plainly taking place. The…

A Nebraska pup apparently took “shotgun rider” way too literally … because cops say the dog accidentally fired a real shotgun from inside a parked truck. The bizarre incident went down Saturday in Scottsbluff … where police responded to reports…

Eric Rosenbrook — a reality star formerly on “90 Day Fiancé” — cut a deal with prosecutors in a battery case involving his wife. The deal called for Eric to plead guilty to “disorderly conduct, domestic abuse assessments” in exchange for a…

Welcome to The Hill’s Business & Economy newsletter {beacon} Business & Economy Business & Economy   The Big Story Hassett: Energy prices will drop ‘like nothing you’ve ever seen before’ National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett said energy prices are going to fall at an unprecedented rate once Iran reopens the Strait of Hormuz. ©…

{beacon} Energy & Environment Energy & Environment   The Big Story DOE eyes using plutonium for nuclear power The Energy Department may allow up to five companies to use its surplus plutonium, which has historically been used in nuclear warheads, as fuel. © Ted Shaffrey, Associated Press The department has selected the firms for “advanced…

Clarence B. Jones, a key adviser to Martin Luther King Jr. who helped organize the March on Washington and assisted King in drafting the Civil Rights leader’s “I Have a Dream” speech, has died. His family says the attorney and academic “passed away peacefully, surrounded by family, in Cupertino, California” on May 22. He was […]

It may seem strange that Pope Leo XIV apologized for the church’s role in slavery within his first encyclical, Magnifica Humanitas (Magnificent Humanity), in which he said artificial intelligence is dangerous and must be disarmed. “It is impossible not to feel deep sorrow when contemplating the immense suffering and humiliation endured by so many in stark contrast to their immeasurable dignity as persons infinitely loved by the Lord,” he wrote in the letter to the church that was made public Monday. “For this, in the name of the Church, I sincerely ask for pardon.”

But Leo addressing slavery and this emergent technology in the same document is not strange at all. The encyclical in its entirety addresses the question of humanity: who can be regarded as human, and the problem with AI using human labor, experiences and cultures to empower machines to replace humans. It was important to the pope to acknowledge the failure of the church to see the humanity of enslaved persons. The church was perfectly fine with saving souls while allowing institutions and governments to enslave other people, especially Africans. It was even fine with the enslavement of those who converted.

In the present day, Leo argues that AI is helping to create a new form of colonialism that appropriates data and transforms personal lives into exploitable information. Moreover, he says in the encyclical that “new forms of slavery are fueled by economic chains and digital infrastructures.” Leo calling AI one of the “new forms of enslavement” would have rung hollow, if not hypocritical, had he not acknowledged the church’s complicity in slavery.

He argues that “if technology becomes the ultimate criterion, the human person risks being reduced to data, a cog in a machine or a commodity. If, however, technology is integrated with a wise perspective, it can become an instrument of growth, justice and fraternity.”

It is a sign of the threat Leo believes AI poses to humanity that he personally announced his own encyclical. Generally, cardinals and other church officials announce and hold a news conference announcing key points of the letter to the public. But on this occasion, the pope convened a panel of theologians and the co-founder of Anthropic, Christopher Olah, who was seated next to Leo. Together, the panel introduced the encyclical, with final comments by Leo, during which they made the particularly strong point that AI must be disarmed.

The pope said the core of the document is a question: What happens to human beings considering the tasks and technologies AI is consuming and replacing?

In addition, the panel was accompanied by a powerful and compelling video presentation covering the advances of technology and the popes from Pope Leo XIII era and the encyclical Rerum Novarum to AI and Pope Leo. The point was to convey the long line of history of the church confronting technological advances and engaging them through the lens of Catholic social teaching and the value of the human person.

Part of the important work of the Vatican is now to promote the encyclical through new media. Images and video have arisen from the new Dicastery for Promoting Human Development to help people understand what is at stake. The first image is of the Tower of Babel compared with Jerusalem. The image lays out what is at stake: Babel — humanity without God, uniformity and dehumanization — or Jerusalem — God at the center, diversity, brotherhood and collaboration. The encyclical video is a professional, compelling production showcasing the beauty of personhood and human beings.

Leo calling for the disarming of AI has a figurative meaning but also a more literal one. AI is not only transforming our way of life, but also how it can normalize war through the use of AI technology. As Leo put it, “The Holy See has recently observed that the growing ease with which autonomous weapons systems can be deployed makes war more ‘feasible’ and less subject to human control.” The Pentagon blacklisted Anthropic, the company Olah co-founded, and contracted with other companies after Anthropic insisted that certain parameters be in place to guide the Department of Defense’s use of its AI technology in warfare.

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‘Wars of choice…are immoral’: Priest unpacks Pope Leo’s condemnation of Trump’s war with Iran

April 11, 2026 / 07:45

While there are many takeaways from the encyclical that should be explored over the next months and years as AI becomes increasingly a part of our everyday lives, both in useful and detrimental ways, the message of Leo’s first encyclical is clear: “Only together — those who design the systems and those who suffer their effects, the richest and the poorest countries, institutions and individuals, centers of power and peripheries — will we be able to build a future not for a privileged few, but for the entire human family.”

The Catholic Church “intervened several times in order to regulate and legitimize forms of subjugation, and, in certain cases, the enslavement of “infidels.” The church didn’t stand up and defend humanity when past governments and institutions reduced human beings to chattel. His apology for slavery, then, was not just an acknowledgment of the past but a determination not to repeat some of those mistakes when dealing with AI and its effects on humanity.

The post Pope Leo apologized for the church’s role in slavery — and warned AI risks similar mistakes appeared first on MS NOW.

This story appeared in The Logoff, a daily newsletter that helps you stay informed about the Trump administration without letting political news take over your life. Subscribe here.

Welcome to The Logoff: The Trump administration wants federal employees to sign broad new non-disclosure agreements. 

Why do this? President Donald Trump and members of his administration have long railed against leakers and media organizations for disclosing information about their actions, ranging from the status of the US-Iran war to FBI Director Kash Patel’s alleged drinking habits in recent months. A general NDA would create a new avenue to quash such disclosures and could deter government employees from making them. 

The second Trump administration has previously implemented NDAs — and in some cases, polygraph tests — at a smaller scale for employees at the Defense Department and other agencies.

What would the NDA cover? Narrowly speaking, the proposed NDA doesn’t do much. According to the Office of Personnel Management, it would “document Federal employees’ acknowledgment of, and agreement to comply with, current legal obligations to safeguard non-public, confidential, or proprietary information.”  In context, though, it would be another tool for the Trump administration’s crackdown on leaks.

For now, the plan is still in draft form and will need to clear a 30-day public comment period before being implemented. Each agency would then decide whether to use the NDA. 

What’s the context? The public has often learned useful information about the government’s plans and functioning through the disclosure of the kind of material the NDA seeks to crack down on, both historically and during the current Trump administration. If implemented, it would be yet another step by the Trump administration toward less transparency.

What’s the big picture? The story of Trump’s second term has been his personalization of government. His former personal lawyers in senior roles at the Justice Department, a UFC fight on the White House lawn to mark his birthday, his gilded taste overrunning the Oval Office, and much more. 

Potential NDAs — a fond private-sector tactic calibrated for employees Trump sees as serving him, rather than the American people — are yet another expression of the same impulse.

And with that, it’s time to log off…

I am not personally a New York Knicks fan — my specific basketball fandom is in abeyance until we get the Seattle SuperSonics back — but that doesn’t mean I can’t appreciate some sports joy from an extremely long-suffering franchise, and you can, too. I enjoyed Rodger Sherman’s newsletter on the Knicks’ dominant journey to the NBA Finals, as well as this piece from Defector’s Israel Daramola.

Thanks for reading, have a great evening, and we’ll see you back here tomorrow!