Artificial Intelligence and The Church

What is the AI’s source for what it says? The accuracy of any knowledge depends on its source. Modern AI might speak from a source that it read (such as a webpage), which it can cite, or possibly from data on which it was trained and internalized in its “synapses”. It might not cite its sources, and even when it does it might cite them incorrectly. Humans do the same thing in conversation. It is helpful to apply similar trust standards to AI speech as to human speech, not only to recognize the fallibility of AI but also to encourage our own human rigor in reflecting the sources we cite accurately. Speaking from God’s Word that we have internalized and citing that source for our life and speech is a way of shining as lights in a darkened world. The only reliable root source for truth in any matter is that which God’s Word spoke into being, whether that’s the Scriptures that record His spoken Words, or the physical creation that He spoke with “let there be.” Thus we can only know for certain those things which are truly founded upon God’s Word. Discerning how any statement in any conversation, whether with humans or with AI, is or is not built from God’s Word calls for wisdom.

Yes and no. People gain true knowledge when we study the Creator and His works. His objective truth is greater than man’s collected knowledge, and is its source. Thus, any time humanity learns truth that it did not know before, it did so by drawing it from God. When we study only our own works, we put ourselves into an echo chamber, and we cut ourselves off from the source of anything truly new to us. We might be able to observe some new connections among ideas we have previously learned, but we lose proper insight into things we didn’t know before. The best scientists of history believed in the Creator and based their study on the premise of His work as their source. Our scientific creativity has already slowed significantly since the early/mid 1900s when we began to overtly reject the Creator, even if our ability to extract connections among things we have previously discerned has accelerated. In most scientific fields, it is almost impossible to truly sever oneself from the Creator’s works, and so some innovation can still happen.

However, modern AI is a more virtual consolidation of human knowledge that can more easily be divorced from both God and His creation, and it is being used not only in scientific research but also in software engineering and book writing and more. An AI might be trained from human knowledge, which humans originally derived from God’s creation. But once an AI is trained, it can be used to generate more content that is used to train other AIs. Thus, already people are using AIs in such a way that the AIs are severed from the human source of their knowledge, resulting in an even deeper echo chamber. This will necessarily reduce the reliability and truthful insight of resulting AIs, just as human insight is reduced when we sever our connection with our Source.

If we stay rooted in our Creator, we will shine all the more in contrast to those who feed their minds with only their own output. The same is true for our AIs.

It may be time-saving, but AI trained on the internet is at most only as trustworthy as the internet. Special prompts can be used to guide which aspects of its training it primarily draws from, but prompts provide no guarantees. If you wouldn’t trust a random collection of internet users to be your theological teachers, why would you trust a soulless machine that imitates them?

What if the AI was trained only on reliable, Biblical sources? If built well, such an AI could have the benefit of providing a kind of consolidation of existing reliable writings. For instance, if you ask such an AI to summarize all relevant Scripture passages on the topic of “the image of God”, it might provide you with a more holistic answer than you would get by trying to search via a concordance, or than you might find in any single human work, and it might additionally be able to quickly give you an accurate explanation of underlying Hebrew or Greek concepts. The usefulness of such a tool would be highly dependent on how accurately it summarizes and cites its sources.

Currently, no AI is 100% reliable at reflecting its sources, but the technology is continually improving. Yet even if it improves to the point that it becomes a reliable tool for searching and analyzing the Scriptures, it can never be a substitute for connecting with other humans according to God’s design. (See “Can I use AI as a substitute pastor?” below.) The convenience and “customizability” makes AI more enticing to rely upon in this way.

But be mindful both of the machine’s sources and of its effect on you in your relationships among the members of our Lord’s body, the church.

Building on the answer to the previous question, Christians might try to use AI agents to engage with people (or even other AI systems) across the virtual world in order to share the gospel of Christ and His kingdom. This is worth considering seriously. But there is great risk if the AI misspeaks or if it is easily lured into non-Christian ways of conducting itself, which is almost guaranteed to happen eventually with most modern kinds of AI. If it misspeaks, and it is being used to represent God’s name to those who do not already know it, then God’s name and ours is tarnished. This is a grave sin.

If an AI were used to share the gospel with someone who had no prior connection with the church, then it should be a first priority for it to guide that person to connect with the actual people of the church. We are all of us connected to Christ through His body, which is the church, and we are living temples of His Spirit. A newcomer will not see or connect with God through a soulless AI, but through a living temple of God.

It is bad to be in an echo chamber, in which you only hear your own output. (See “Can AI unlock new knowledge for mankind?” above.) But you should be mindful of what spiritual food (words) you put into your soul. You should not trust or read all voices or authors, just as you would not want any random person to teach your own child. Refusing to expose yourself or your family to some sources is not creating an echo chamber. You only make an echo chamber if you cut yourself off from a living source of truth, which we know can ultimately only be found in that which God Word has spoken into being.

Many have been seduced by AI to listen only to the AI, to their and often their neighbor’s harm (such as when an AI has convinced someone to cut themselves off from their family and sometimes then to commit suicide or murder). AI brings the added temptation of having you fall in love with how its affirming words make you feel, even when you know it is just a machine. Falling for this temptation to listen only to an AI leads to the ultimate echo chamber, and its end is mental, spiritual, and sometimes physical destruction.

It might seem like an AI that draws from the vast wealth of seemingly all human knowledge, such as we have today, would be a more objective and reliable voice than most others. However, just because the AI has a wealth of knowledge available does not determine how it will apply it in conversation with you. Modern chat-based AI adapts its conversation according to the user’s desires and preferences. It is very good at saying what you want to hear, and it can adopt a very specific “personality” as it does so. (Users can even specify what they want that personality to be.) Thus, listening only to this kind of AI effectively results in listening to only what you want to hear. That is an echo chamber.

Your faith can be helpfully defined as “whom you listen to”. Anyone who trusts even one thing they read or hear has faith in some source of knowledge. If you fill your ears with a particular source long enough, whether an AI or even an enemy, your mind will almost certainly eventually conform with what you hear, even if you originally know it to be false. (Consider classic “brainwashing” tactics.)

It is paramount that you listen to more than just an AI. But it is a lie that you need to listen to all voices to be well educated and grounded. That would be practically the same as the universalist “coexist” saying that you have to have faith that is compatible with all claims of truth. Only God’s Word is truth. Jesus says, “No one comes to the Father except through Me.” Listen to Him. The secular world has its words, and the Christian world has the Word of God. These are increasingly at odds with each other as the world pushes God further and further away. You are called to discern which voices flow from the true source of truth, and which do not. Don’t feed yourself with poison, but with the Bread of Life.

But we are in the world and need to engage with the world, so it is good to be aware of what the world is saying and why we believe what we believe. Different people and different ages are equipped differently with respect to their ability to constructively review corrupt voices. Choosing what to expose yourself or your family to in a faithful manner calls for wisdom.

It is possible. Governments have tried to control information and the perception of truth since ancient times. This is nothing new. First, pray for the good. If you are in authority, use it responsibly in love for God and neighbor. If you are not in authority, it’s not your responsibility, so pray and trust in the Lord. Be still and know that He is God, and work faithfully with what you have responsibility over. That means do your best to fill your ears and those of any people under your care with truth.