ROME — Language AI pioneer Marco Trombetti took a plea for dignity at work to the Vatican on Friday, as Pope Leo XIV received about 20 AI leaders, academics, and scientists after a closed-door dialogue on the technology’s future.
Trombetti’s AI translation system Translated’s offers live translation of Mass in 60 languages at St Peter’s Basilica.
The meeting was organised by the Pontifical Academy for Life and the Future of Life Institute, a nonprofit studying technology risks.
In his address to the tech leaders he had gathered the Pope said machines are tools, not persons, and that technology must serve the common good, with its benefits shared fairly.
“I see a tendency towards monopoly in the AI race,” Trombetti said, warning that control of computing power, data, and users “can keep strengthening the position of those already ahead.”
“AI can create wealth while eroding our sense of purpose and dignity in work, even when jobs and incomes survive,” said Trombetti, cofounder and chief executive of Translated. “We must share not only the wealth AI creates, but the opportunity to contribute.”
“The Vatican initiative is timely, but the loss of human purpose is not something AI invented,” said Matt Hasan, an economist and founder of The AI Humanist Movement. “AI exposes longstanding institutional failures to recognize human dignity, judgment, and contribution.”
Craft and control
“A copywriter who now spends the day fixing AI drafts still has a paycheck, but the craft they trained for is gone, and no unemployment figure will ever show that loss,” said Robert Ciborowski, cofounder of AI game platform Chatforce.
Mykyta Chernenko, founder of the writing platform AIWriteBook, offered a test. “Human participation is real only when a person can change the outcome, not just click approve at the end,” he said.
Not everyone thinks the worry goes far enough. “Trombetti is correct about that, but his fear horizon is still extremely restricted compared to the real risks of AI to human society,” said Demetrius Floudas, a visiting scholar at the University of Cambridge.
In September 2025, Trombetti helped draft Fraternity in the Age of AI, an appeal on AI governance, with Geoffrey Hinton and Yoshua Bengio. In May, President Sergio Mattarella named him a Cavaliere del Lavoro (Knight of Labour), Italy’s highest honour for business merit.
For a company built on human translators, the argument is practical as well as moral. “Care, education and service are contributions too,” Trombetti said.
