I do hope Pope Leo gives us an encyclical on Artificial Intelligence, and soon...

For years I've kept a little "prayer list" close by me — sometimes it's just a slip of scrap paper with names jotted down haphazardly as the needs became known.

There is also a little book I keep, prayers for "long term" issues that I know will require ongoing intercession — a friend whose wife has been struggling with cancer and chemo for nearly eight years can be found there, along with a neurodivergent young man who has defied every dire and hopeless early pronouncement the doctors and experts pealed over him 20 years ago. I'm positive his terrific family and therapies have had much to do with that, but I believe the faithful prayers of their many friends has also contributed to his astonishing successes.

Often I will add a word beside a name, to recall the need. Lately "cancer" is showing up a lot as so many friends share news of their diagnoses or face arduous treatment.

"Job search" too, is appearing more and more. As a writer and editor my internal rolodex is populated with so many friends in media and it seems too many of them are becoming displaced or laid off thanks to the unsurprising discovery that Artificial Intelligence is fairly trustworthy at delivering basic information.

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