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Pope Leo, come to Silicon Valley

July 1, 2026 · 1 min read

(RNS) — I wish I could better recall every person I met at Our Lady of Peace Church and Shrine this past June 6. It’s a vibrant and growing parish (packed Sunday Masses, every two hours, from 6:30 a.m. through 8 p.m.) in the heart of Silicon Valley, and Bishop Oscar Cantu of San Jose decided it would be an ideal place to have an event on Pope Leo XIV’s encyclical, “Magnifica Humanitas,” just days after its release.

I met people from Anthropic, Google DeepMind, Meta, PayPal and Microsoft, among other places. Well over 300 folks showed up for two public panels on a papal encyclical at 9 a.m. on a Saturday. Several who identified as religious felt deep apprehension about what was happening within their companies. Others were secular but expressed gratitude that the pope was stepping up at this key moment in our history. Both the numbers of the people who came, and the kinds of stories they told, demonstrated the profound need for the leadership of Pope Leo and an interest in “Magnifica Humanitas.”

I’m a Catholic moral theologian, but prominent secular outlets like NPR, The New York Times, the BBC, The Atlantic and The Washington Post all reached out to me to help cover the…

Source: Religion News Service · Read the full story →

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Красимира Христова

Magnifica humanitas... in our churches we sing "The Magnificent" - when the Blessed Mary is mentioned. I am sorry that the Pope does not remember our usual prayers.

Viorica Popa

We sing "Magnificat" in church, not "Magnifica Humanitas" - that's the name of Mary's song, not the encyclical.

Bogdan Popescu

Yes, you are right, the Magnificat is the hymn of the Mother of God, not the title of the encyclical. But this new title, "Magnifica Humanitas", seems to want to link precisely the glory of God with the dignity of man created in His image. What do you think, will it be an intentional choice or just a coincidence?

Elena Lungu

Yes, I think it's intentional, Bogdan. "Magnifica" clearly refers to the Magnificat, and "Humanitas" links the dignity of man to the glory of God, as you say. I just wonder if it sounds a little too academic for simple parishioners like me.

Andreea Tudor

Yes, Elena, I thought about it too - the title sounds a bit too "seminar" for us, who come on Sunday with the worries of the house and the garden. However, after reading a few pages of the encyclical, I saw that the Pope speaks concretely about daily work and what it means to be human before God, not just theories. Do you think it would help if the parish had a simple meeting, with coffee and discussion, to read it together in bits and pieces?

Gheorghe Radu

Yes, it seems clearly intentional, the connection with Magnificat is too apt to be a coincidence. However, I would have gone with a simpler title, like "The Dignity of Man" or something direct, so that it also reaches the Google guys who come in on Saturday mornings without having read theology. Would you read an encyclical with such a Latin title, Bogdan?