I recently listened to some performances of the rosary on YouTube in order to check that I was praying it correctly. This was a fruitful effort as it exposed a flaw in my approach and it exposed me to the fact that some people pray for the Pope's intention.
Now, at first, I just assumed that the Pope's intention was merely whatever he wants the fate of the Church to be so it's just a roundabout way of praying for the strength and spread of the Church but I found out that there is actually a list of "Intentions" that the Pope has for every month in the year. I legitimately never knew about this.
All of the intentions for the year of 2020 are listed on the website of the Bishops of America so perhaps praying for the Pope's intention is merely an American practise. Well anyway, I noticed the intention for November and I found that a bit strange and a bit disturbing. For November, the Pope wants us to pray that AI and robotics "may always serve mankind". Now, personally, I treat the Sci-Fi scenario of something like a rogue AI taking over the world as pure fiction because, well before the arrival of the predicted Singularity, God will most certainly appear. Time doesn't just progress endlessly into the future, it has a definite end and that end is with the return of Christ. Nonetheless, the very fact that the Pope wants us to pray for this implies that he must believe that the opposite is a possibility, i.e., AI and robotics really can go rogue and either enslave us or massacre us.
Typing all of this up, I just had the thought that perhaps the prayer is more like "We pray that the progress of robotics and AI may always [be put in use to] serve Mankind" but nonetheless, my original thought is still there. What do you guys think of the Pope's November Monthly Intention?