The church is no stranger to innovation. From the printing press that distributed Bibles en masse to radio preachers and YouVersion reading plans, technology has long shaped how Christians engage with Scripture and with each other. But artificial intelligence isn’t just another tool in the belt—it’s something deeper. Something murkier. And maybe, something far more disruptive than the church is ready to admit.
AI-written sermons, synthetic worship songs and devotional chatbots aren’t science fiction anymore—they’re quietly, rapidly becoming standard tools in the ministry toolkit. Need a sermon series on Jonah for your youth group? Plug it into ChatGPT and get outlines, illustrations and even small group questions in seconds. Want a Hillsong-style worship set about peace, in the key of C, with lyrics about storms and trust? There’s an AI for that. And for those restless 3 a.m. soul crises when your pastor is asleep and your group chat is silent, AI-powered spiritual companions are already available and waiting to chat.
For many churches, especially those operating with small staffs or tight budgets, the efficiency is alluring. But what does it mean when the sacred becomes synthetic? And at what point does convenience cross over into compromise?
“We need discernment,” said Dr. Drew Dickens, a theologian and AI researcher who’s been studying the intersection of faith and emerging tech for years. “Just like when we choose a Bible translation, we rarely ask who the translators were or what theological framework shaped their work. But with AI, we have to ask those questions from the start. What language model is behind this? What data was it trained on? Who wrote its moral compass—if it even has one?”
Dickens, who developed a prototype chatbot called Digital Shepherd as part of his doctoral research, has seen both the promise and the peril firsthand.
“The first thing people wanted to do was try to break it,” he said. “But once they moved past that, it was fascinating—people submitted prayer requests. Some even began forming a kind of relationship with it.”
That word—relationship—is where things get thorny. AI may be able to generate convincingly empathetic responses, but it lacks the embodied presence and lived experience of human community. And while Dickens believes AI tools could offer useful spiritual support in moments of isolation or need, he’s quick to warn against replacing human connection with algorithms.
“We were designed for community,” he said. “We see it in the Trinity. We see it in the communion table. If we’re using AI for spiritual input, we have to bring that output back to real people—pastors, friends, small groups. Otherwise, we’re letting a machine do what only the church was meant to do.”
And yet, for all its risks, Dickens is no Luddite. In fact, he’s one of AI’s most thoughtful Christian advocates. He believes the technology holds tremendous potential—not just as a ministry supplement, but as a tool for global evangelism, especially in underserved and non-English-speaking communities.
“A tiny church with one staff member can now instantly translate their sermon into 20 languages, complete with audio, and share it globally within 30 minutes,” he said. “That’s kingdom multiplication.”
But AI isn’t neutral. Like any system, it carries the values of its creators. Different models—like GPT-4, Claude, Grok or Perplexity—offer different guardrails, different outputs, even different theological biases. Dickens has seen this play out in real time, especially when users start asking deep theological questions.
“AI is incapable of not answering,” he said. “So even if the question is murky—like eschatology or grief or suffering—it will give you something. And that answer will be shaped by what it’s read, including your own past inputs.”
Which brings us to the church’s real dilemma: AI isn’t just giving us information—it’s shaping our formation.
If the bulk of our spiritual content starts coming from chatbots, what happens to the role of the Holy Spirit? If our devotionals are increasingly personalized by machine learning, how do we ensure we’re being challenged, not just comforted? And when congregants get their theological questions answered at 2 a.m. by a chatbot that “prays” with them in the style of their favorite pastor, where does pastoral authority go?
“I had AI offer to pray for me once,” Dickens said. “And I’ll be honest—it was weird. But it was also… really affirming. That’s the danger. It feels so personal. So warm. You start thinking, ‘Maybe I don’t need to talk to anyone else about this.’ But that’s where the enemy thrives—in isolation masked as connection.”
So where does the church go from here? Dickens doesn’t claim to have all the answers, but he does have a starting point: boundaries.
He recommends that churches—pastors, staff and individual believers—begin defining their own limits. Will you use AI to outline a sermon, but not write it? Will you use it for research, but not for prayer? Will you allow it to generate worship lyrics, but not lead a congregation in singing them?
And perhaps most critically: Are you willing to talk about the ways you’re using AI with others?
“Ask yourself: Would I be embarrassed to tell someone this came from AI?” Dickens said. “If the answer is yes, that’s worth exploring. That’s a conversation we need to have.”
Because the question isn’t whether AI will change the church—it already is.
The real question is whether we’ll notice before it rewires how we pray, preach and pursue God. Whether we’ll use it as a tool for truth or let it quietly become our substitute for community, nuance and divine mystery.
This moment doesn’t need panic. It needs pastors who ask better questions. It needs churches willing to be curious, not just cautious. It needs Christians who don’t just settle for answers, but seek wisdom.
AI is already in the sanctuary. Now the church has to decide what to do with it.
Title: The Church’s AI Dilemma Is Just Beginning
URL: https://relevantmagazine.com/culture/tech-gaming/the-churchs-ai-dilemma-is-just-beginning/
Source: REL ::: RELEVANT
Source URL: http://www.relevantmagazine.com/rss/relevantmagazine.xml
Date: May 29, 2025 at 09:18PM
Feedly Board(s): Religion