> The pope is concerned that AI falls into this category of "challenge to human dignity" because it gives the sense that man's cognitive abilities are not unique.
While this concern certainly exists to some extent in the Church, and may be somewhere in the Pope's thoughts, his explicit comparison to the Industrial Revolution and Rerum Novarum's response to it, and to it as a threat not only to human dignity but also to justice and labor, indicates that a—arguably the—major concern is for it as a potential occasion of and force for material mistreatment.
Yes, or to put it more precisely, the attack on human dignity for which concern is being shown is precisely the injustice that AI can become the handmaiden of.
I am not sure through which lens I should read this comment. Is it sarcasm, or hope? Because as seen from my side, the wealth gets mainly transferred to a handful of billionaires, and that process is only speeding up. But maybe I'm just blind to the wealth transfer to the street sweeper or Amazon driver, in which case yes the future should be bright.
While this concern certainly exists to some extent in the Church, and may be somewhere in the Pope's thoughts, his explicit comparison to the Industrial Revolution and Rerum Novarum's response to it, and to it as a threat not only to human dignity but also to justice and labor, indicates that a—arguably the—major concern is for it as a potential occasion of and force for material mistreatment.