The Psycho-Spiritual Crisis of the Digital Age: A Critical Review of Magnifica Humanitas

Abstract

Digital technologies, social media, and artificial intelligence are now driving our attention, communication, identity formation, decision-making, and access to knowledge. Their influence is neither as good nor as bad as it seems in the media and the narrative, and the outcomes are not always identical. This article focuses on Pope Leo XIV’s 2026 encyclical, Magnifica Humanitas. It critically analyses its theological anthropology in light of contemporary research on digital well-being, loneliness, adolescent identity, cognitive attention, disinformation, and human-AI interaction. The analysis argues that the most appropriate and reasonable way to describe the current problem is to recognise that it is not a universal psychological pathology produced by technology, but rather an anthropological and moral problem exacerbated by digital life. The theological distinction between Babel and Jerusalem offers a theological perspective to evaluate whether technologies promote domination, homogenisation and reductionism or, on the contrary, encourage participation, solidarity, truth and the common good. The paper highlights attention and interiority, digitally mediated identity, loneliness and communion, delegation of judgement to AI, truth and shared reality, based on development. The article concludes that a credible Christian response should neither romanticise pre-digital life nor be dismissive of technological innovation. However, it should instead build human judgement, embodied community, moral responsibility, contemplative practices, and institutional forms of technology governance. The limitations of the existing evidence are both in correlational studies and in the limited data on the correlation between digital practices and explicitly religious and spiritual outcomes.