By RENEE WEBB
Content and Design Coordinator

Advancements in artificial intelligence (AI) have been capturing headlines for several years now, but the frequency in coverage has grown as the use of this technology itself explodes.

Among the coverage has been a debate of the pros and cons of using AI. Even church leaders have weighed in on the subject.
                
Pope Francis made several public comments about AI in the last years of his life and even gave a talk on the subject to international leaders at the G7 Summit in 2024. In January 2025, a doctrinal note titled Antiqua et Nova addressing the relationship between artificial intelligence and human intelligence was released by the Dicasteries for Doctrine and Faith and for Culture and Education. In May, Pope Leo XIV promulgated his first encyclical, Magnifica Humanitas: On Safeguarding the Human Person in the Time of Artificial Intelligence.
               
As a former computer engineer, the topic has been of great interest to Father David Esquiliano, who is a canon lawyer and pastor of Cathedral Parish in Sioux City.
               
“It piques my interest because I see artificial intelligence as another tool,” he said. “It is a tool that can be beneficial – productive and efficient.”                

Many church leaders, added Father Esquiliano, also view it as a useful instrument but want people to remember that “it is a tool, a human development” which should not be void of ethical human oversight nor harm humanity.

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By DAWN PROSSER
Director of Communications
 
Retired diocesan priest Father Brian Hughes of Milford had an interest in architecture as a teen and planned to attend the Iowa State University School of Architecture and then “my prayer life intervened and drew me into the seminary.”
 
He was ordained in 1981 in Emmetsburg, but that wouldn’t be the end of his formal education. About 11 years later, Bishop Lawrence Soens recognized he needed someone with expertise regarding renovation of churches and construction of new churches to advise him so he approached his young priest.
 Father Brian Hughes in Milford St. Joseph ChurchUpon the bishop’s request, Father Hughes researched several schools of architecture around the country including the University of Virginia where the head of the department was “the only architectural historian who had written articles about William (LaBarthe) Steele.”
 
“It was a great program for me,” he said. “I went there with the understanding that I wanted to study ecclesiastical architecture in general and the Prairie Style in particular and William Steele in particular."

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