For the first time in history, the pope is an American — from Chicago, no less. And like many Americans, Pope Leo XIV seems to love a good yap. Whether it concerns President Donald Trump’s immigration policies or the use of artificial intelligence in popular entertainment, Leo has not been shy about expressing his views (he recently said he uses a different starting word every day when playing the New York Times’s Wordle game.)

An American pope speaking about American issues, and in a manner that at least seems to be an implicit criticism of the American president, would be big news in any era. But at a moment when “tradcath” converts to Catholicism are increasingly influential — and increasingly angry about what they see as the Vatican’s turn to “wokeness” — I thought there would be particular value in speaking with someone who covers not only the pope and the Vatican full-time, but also Catholics in American politics.

What is Catholic social teaching?

Catholic social teaching is the collection of traditions, principles, and beliefs, based in the Bible, natural law, and papal writings, that outline how people should be treated and how societies should be organized. Usually, these principles are condensed into seven themes:

So I reached out to Michael Sean Winters, a longtime columnist for the National Catholic Reporter, to discuss all things Pope Leo and to get a better sense of whether there really is tension between the freshman pontiff and the US president (and that president’s supporters), learn more about why Pope Leo seems so focused on immigration, and get a better sense of why Leo also seems deeply worried about the role AI will play in the future. This conversation has been edited for clarity and length.

I’ve noticed lately that people on both sides of the political divide are interpreting Pope Leo’s comments as unusually political or unusually focused on domestic concerns in the US. Some people go so far as to suggest he’s

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