Pope Leo XIV centered his address to a meeting at the Santo Toribio de Mogrovejo Catholic University in Chiclayo, Peru on the “noble” mission of universities to create hope in “a living community where the search for truth becomes an act of love and service to the great human family.” Continuing the debate he launched in his encyclical, Magnifica Humanitas, Pope Leo sharply contrasted that mission, where the dialogue between science and religion, faith and reason, aims “always [at) seeking the common good,” where scientific innovation is used “to bridge social divides and heal society’s wounds,” to the deadly “technocratic paradigm,” in which education’s purpose is “only to produce a skilled workforce for an exclusive and highly competitive market.”

As Bishop of Chiclayo, Pope Leo had also served as Grand Chancellor of the university, named after a Peruvian saint from the colonial period famous for tirelessly caring for the indigenous people of Peru, and learning their languages to do so. Between six- and nine-thousand people—school administrators, professors, and students from 18 universities from across the region, joined by local political and civil authorities—were present.

“A progress that is indifferent to justice and the dignity of workers becomes, in fact, a mechanism of oppression and exclusion,” he warned. “The Catholic university therefore has a duty to remind the public and political spheres that science without a conscience ruins everyone’s life. In the same way, technology without a soul does not truly improve life;” it “bears the imprint, interests and ambitions of those who design and control it….

“The most deadly risk is that of submission to the technocratic paradigm, which reduces reality to material data, considering efficiency to be the supreme value.