One Tech Billionaire Just Defended the Pope — While the Others Turned on Him

LinkedIn’s co-founder breaks ranks with fellow tech titans by backing Pope Leo XIV’s call for “moral discernment” in AI — a striking contrast to recent attacks from Marc Andreessen and Peter Thiel.

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The reflections begin November 30 and run through Christmas Day.

Today’s essay is a subscriber-only deep dive into an extraordinary and underreported turn of events at the intersection of tech, religion, and global ethics.

In the past few weeks, two of Silicon Valley’s most famous billionaires launched an unprecedented offensive against Pope Leo XIV — the first American pontiff — for his insistence that artificial intelligence must be guided by moral truth.

Peter Thiel even went so far as to name Leo as a potential Antichrist and urged Vice President JD Vance to ignore the pope’s moral guidance. Yet outside our community, these malicious attacks barely registered on the mainstream radar.

Letters from Leo led the charge in calling out this outrage, helping to raise international awareness of what’s at stake.

Now comes a twist that only this era could produce: another tech titan, LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman, has stepped forward to defend Pope Leo’s AI call.

Hoffman’s public response stands in remarkable contrast to the sneering of his peers like Marc Andreessen and Peter Thiel.

While some tech moguls mock or demonize the pope for challenging their worldview, Hoffman is telling the Valley to listen.

He argues that Pope Leo’s message about ethical AI isn’t Luddite alarmism — it’s a much-needed dose of wisdom for an industry hurtling forward without a moral compass.

This is the kind of story that falls through the cracks in siloed media. Tech outlets don’t usually cover popes. Religion reporters often miss the tech drama. Political pundits overlook the theological underpinnings.

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Today’s essay unpacks why Hoffman is backing the pope, how it flips the script on Silicon Valley’s AI debate, and what it means as Pope Leo XIV prepares a major teaching on technology.

We’ll explore how the first U.S.-born pope found an ally in a Silicon Valley legend, even as others in the Valley attack him, and why this alliance could prove pivotal in the battle to ensure AI serves humanity rather than undermines it.

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In early November, Pope Leo XIV used his social media megaphone to deliver a warning to AI developers, one that blends ancient wisdom with urgently modern concerns.

“Technological innovation can be a form of participation in the divine act of creation,” he wrote, stressing that technology carries real ethical and spiritual weight. “The Church therefore calls all builders of #AI to cultivate moral discernment as a fundamental part of their work — to develop systems that reflect justice, solidarity, and a genuine reverence for life.”

It was a straightforward exhortation for tech to remember its humanity.

That papal tweet hit a nerve in Silicon Valley’s elite circles. Venture capitalist Marc Andreessen — a self-professed “techno-optimist” — reacted with derision, effectively launching a meme-war with the pope.

Andreessen quote-posted Leo’s message with a mocking image and a sarcastic swipe, dismissing the pope’s ethical tone as if it were “woke” nagging.

The stunt backfired spectacularly.

A wave of backlash (even from tech leaders of faith) prompted Andreessen to scrub his post in retreat. But the damage was done.

In one flippant tweet, he revealed many in Silicon Valley’s deep disdain for moral guardrails.

As we noted at the time, Andreessen’s outburst exposed what might be called the original sin of Big Tech: the refusal to recognize any authority greater than itself.

If Andreessen’s jab was not outrageous enough, Peter Thiel went further.

The PayPal co-founder and patron of America’s populist right has been privately sermonizing about the apocalypse, and in a leaked lecture he outright cast Pope Leo XIV as a possible Antichrist figure.

Thiel told listeners — including allies like JD Vance — that Leo’s calls for ethical restraint were part of an end-times deception, and he even advised Vance to ignore the pope on all moral matters.

Let that sink in: one of the most influential figures in tech and politics essentially painted the Bishop of Rome as a demonic imposter, unworthy of a Catholic’s attention.

It was a stunning escalation of rhetoric, especially against a pope who has merely been emphasizing age-old Christian teaching about putting people before profit.

While these attacks bordered on surreal, Letters from Leo was on the front lines debunking and defending. We made sure the story didn’t stay buried in niche forums. Our reporting and analysis drew wider attention to this clash — from San Francisco news outlets to international tech columns.

The spectacle of (some in) Silicon Valley vs. the Vatican is no longer hypothetical; it’s here, and the world is starting to notice.

Pope Leo XIV (man in white with baseball bat, aboard the papal plane during a recent trip) has repeatedly warned that a “soulless” approach to AI can lead to antihuman outcomes. He insists that technology, to truly serve humanity, must be guided by conscience and oriented toward human dignity.

Amid this pitched battle, an unexpected champion for Leo’s message emerged.

Reid Hoffman — billionaire entrepreneur, venture capitalist, and one of tech’s biggest optimists — broke ranks with the Silicon Valley crowd to publicly back Pope Leo’s stance on AI.

Here’s what happened.