Unspecified AI chatbot answered as if Francis were still pope

What happened

At a lunch with the Spanish bishops during his Madrid trip, Pope Leo XIV told them a story. This is secondhand: the remark was not recorded or part of any official speech. Yago de la Cierva, a member of the papal visit’s organising committee who was at the lunch, recounted it, and Aleteia reported it on 8 Jun 2026. A CNA/National Catholic Register story reported the same anecdote.

What was said (verbatim as reported; secondhand)

He asked it, “What should the pope say to the Spanish bishops?” The artificial intelligence chat bot replied, “Pope Francis would say…” So, he interrupted it and said, “Ah, but I think there is another pope now.” The AI then replied, “Oh, that’s true, sorry, it’s now Pope Leo.”

The Pope’s conclusion: “We, on the other hand, have another algorithm. And this other algorithm leads us to love people, to accompany people, to make ourselves servants of the Word.”

Why this is striking

• The subject of the outdated fact was the person asking. This is the purest form of “the model doesn’t believe the present exists”.
• Unlike cases 011 and 016, this model accepted the correction immediately. This is the mild end of the range.
• It came two weeks after Leo XIV’s AI encyclical Magnifica Humanitas.

Correction

Immediate, after one prompt from the user.

Lesson

Even mild cutoff blindness decides how an answer is framed. The model assumed the old world first. Without a correction the user would have got advice written for the previous pope.

Sources

• Aleteia, “Pope Leo XIV laughs as AI ‘forgets’ he is the pontiff” (2026-06-08): aleteia.org
• National Catholic Register (CNA), “Pope Leo XIV Jokes in Spain That AI Still Thinks Pope Francis Is in Charge”: ncregister.com