Pope Leo has denounced leaders who he said twist the truth and disregard the rule of law. He was speaking at the start of a three-day trip to France, the first official papal visit to the country in 18 years.
Huge crowds lined the streets to catch a glimpse of the pontiff in his Popemobile as he travelled between engagements, with hundreds of thousands of people expected to attend an outdoor mass in the centre of the capital on Saturday.
The pope addressed delegates at the headquarters of Unesco, the United Nations agency dedicated to the promotion of education, sciences and culture as an instrument of world peace.
He warned that international institutions were undergoing a “crisis of effectiveness”, with dialogue “seen as an obstacle to action rather than a resource for peace”.
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“Instead of respecting the law, those in power invoke it when it serves their interests and disregard it when it restrains them, treating even justice itself as though it were a commodity to be bought and sold,” Leo said.
International treaties are not enough but require “upright will”, the pontiff told the gathering, “a culture of peace and a shared commitment to peace”.
“We must recognise that the most terrible of ‘human works’ is war,” he said. “For then science itself is placed at the service of an inhumane will to destroy and to kill.”
In an earlier meeting with French president Emmanuel Macron, Leo had urged France to “remain a tireless champion of peace and multilateralism” and had praised its humanitarian and education work in the Middle East, particularly financing for schools and universities.
“We cannot remain indifferent faced with such suffering,” he said of conflict in the region.
The pontiff reiterated his often-expressed concerns about the risks of artificial intelligence, saying that he felt it had been “essential” to dedicate his first major encyclical to the issue due to the risk of losing humanity in a “paradise of machines”.
“Our efforts in this domain must ensure that new technologies remain at the service of the human person rather than becoming yet another instrument of domination and injustice,” he said in his speech at Unesco.
“Scientific progress, when separated from wisdom, can become a weapon of destruction,” Leo said. “Culture, when subjected to ideology, can degenerate into lies and propaganda ... education, when it abandons truth, can become an instrument for manipulating minds.”
The pope is expected to meet people of refugee and migrant backgrounds on Saturday in a closed-door visit to Maison Bakhita, a church-run assistance centre that offers French classes and other training in northern Paris.
Leo has sought to encourage humane attitudes towards migrants in the face of hardening policies and rhetoric about migration around the world, including in France as it faces a presidential election next year.
The pontiff told journalists in advance of his visit to France that his aim was to bring a message of peace, a central theme of his papacy that has at times attracted the ire of global leaders including United States president Donald Trump.
The French press reported that the Vatican declined proposals from the Élysée Palace for a state dinner with Macron and a personal tour of the renovated Notre Dame with the president, something interpreted as a desire to avoid the visit becoming politicised.
The Bishops’ Conference of France has stressed that the visit is an “apostolic journey” focused on faith.
The pontiff is scheduled to spend Sunday in Lourdes, where he is expected to pray at the Grotto of the apparitions at Massabielle at the Sanctuary of Our Lady of Lourdes.
Leo is also expected to meet survivors of clerical sexual abuse in the renowned pilgrimage city.
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