Pope Leo XIV. apologized for the Holy See’s past endorsement of slavery in his first encyclical Magnifica humanitas on artificial intelligence, published on Monday. The AP and AFP agencies noticed it, writes TASR.
- Pope Leo XIV. apologized for endorsing slavery in the encyclical Magnifica humanitas.
- He identified the fact that the church did not condemn slavery for centuries as a blow to the Christian memory.
“It is true that we cannot judge the events of the past anachronistically, that is, as if the moral criteria that have matured over time have always been available. Nevertheless, we cannot deny or minimize how late society and the church condemned this scourge in the form of slavery,” writes Leo XIV. He recalled that in ancient times and the Middle Ages, several individuals and even church institutions kept slaves.
Criticism of historical slavery
The fact that the church did not condemn slavery for centuries was described by the Pope as a “wound in the Christian memory”. Although his predecessors have apologized in the past for the involvement of Christians in the transatlantic slave trade, none of them has ever publicly acknowledged the role of the popes themselves in granting European monarchs the power to subjugate and enslave non-believers.
The AP agency reports that the American pope is a descendant of both slaves and slave owners. Lev was responding to long-standing calls by activists and academics alike for the Holy See to atone for its role in colonial-era human trafficking.
Repentance for the past
“It is impossible not to feel deep sorrow when we consider the immense suffering and humiliation endured by so many people in sharp contrast to their dignity as persons infinitely loved by the Lord,” the Pope wrote in the encyclical. “For that, I sincerely ask for forgiveness on behalf of the Church,” he added.
The AP agency writes that in 1452 Pope Nicholas V gave the bull Dum diversas to the king of Portugal and his successors the right to “invade, conquer, subjugate” anywhere and seize all property, including the lands of “Saracens, heathens, other infidels and enemies of the name of Christ”. He also gave the Portuguese permission to permanently enslave these people.
Leo XIV. in the encyclical Magnifica humanitas, he now recalled that his namesake, Pope Leo XIII. as the first head of the Catholic Church in 1888 she “absolutely and universally” condemned slavery. However, documents against slavery were already issued by earlier popes, for example Eugene IV. in 1435, which in the bull Sicut dudum prohibited the enslavement of the native inhabitants of the Canary Islands. In 1537, Pope Paul III banned in the bull Sublimis Deus the enslavement of Indians and other natives in the newly discovered territories.
