Pope Leo XIV has called on the Catholic Church to defend human creativity against artificial intelligence, telling artists and curators at the Vatican that an "ontological difference" separates art from what machines generate through statistical calculation over millions of existing images. Speaking on 2 October in the Consistory Hall at The Art of Possibility: Weaving Together, a meeting organised by the Dicastery for Culture and Education, he said the Church planned to renew its alliance with artists and cultural institutions. The Pope argued that algorithms lack the human spark, which he said authentic culture and art preserve. He quoted his first encyclical letter, Magnifica Humanitas, published in May, which cautions against AI's encroachment on humanity and holds that true progress cannot be measured by performance or technological speed but through human empathy and connection. The address extends a gesture from May, when Patti Smith inaugurated the Holy See's pavilion at the Venice Biennale with a sound installation inviting visitors to listen and contemplate — a reminder, in the pavilion's framing, that personal intellect rather than generated content remains central to spiritual enrichment. The pavilion borrowed its title, The Ear is the Eye of the Soul, from the Pope's own description of art as an antenna receptive to the great questions of the human heart. The remarks land amid mounting anxiety across the art world over AI-generated imagery, homogenisation and censorship — the explicit themes of the Vatican gathering, which drew artists and curators including contributors to recent editions of the Holy See pavilion.