In late May 2026, a video circulated online supposedly showing Pope Leo XIV saying, "Islam is a religion of peace we can learn from."
The clip and associated posts with similar claims spread on X and Facebook.
(X user @TrumpsHurricane)
This video was created using artificial intelligence. There's no evidence Leo has ever said the aforementioned quote, and a search through all of Leo's speeches on the official Vatican website determined that the pope has not publicly said the words, "Islam is a religion of peace we can learn from," as of this writing. (It's possible the video was inspired by Leo's actual statements about Islam that urged interfaith peace and cooperation.)
As such, we have rated this video as fake.
The first version of this AI-generated video posted online appeared to be an X account called "Wake Up America," which is full of similar AI-generated clips of people accompanied by fake quotes, although Wake Up America's version did not include Leo "speaking." The account's description says it is run by a "GROK AI Enthusiast," and all of the videos on the account are "done and edited with Grok Imagine." Posts of the video on X also had the words, "Create your own with Grok" at the bottom of the video — a tell-tale sign the video was generated using artificial intelligence.
Finally, if the video of Leo were real, journalists with reputable news outlets would have documented it. A reverse image search of a screenshot from the fake clip found no exact matches published by legitimate news sites. Google, DuckDuckGo and Yahoo searches for the quote and the pope's name also returned no relevant results from reputable news outlets.
Snopes has previously debunked numerous AI-generated claims about Leo, including a fake story about Leo revealing U.S. President Donald Trump's supposed IQ results on live television.