The second panel at this conference was moderated by John Pinheiro, Director of Research at the Acton Institute, and featured panelists Michael Matheson Miller, Stephen Barrows and William Bosl. This was the second of two panels at the Acton Institute Conference, “Artificial Intelligence, Human Dignity and the Free Society,” which took place at the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome on Thursday, December 4, 2025.

In 1891 Pope Leo XIII published Rerum Novarum, responding to the “new things” of his era and launching a corpus of modern Catholic social teaching. Pope Leo XIV’s choice of name and his early remarks signal that he thinks we are living in a similarly historic moment of social, cultural, and economic upheaval which will be driven by rapid advances in technology, including artificial intelligence. This conference featured talks by experts in technology, theology, economics, and business to examine what the world needs today to traverse the complex problems which confront humanity.