A.I. for the gospel’s sake
Created with Microsoft Bing Image Creator: “Renaissance Painting of Artificial Intelligence in Biblical Times”
So I’ll be honest. At this point I’m just waiting for Skynet to become self-aware. And, in principle, I’m opposed to removing the human element from that which is most assuredly unique to humanity: the written word. Plus, I have to wonder if the biblical term for artificial intelligence isn’t actually “idol”. (see Isaiah 44)
That being said, I’m willing to suspend judgement for the sake of discovery. There are some pretty cool things for the Christian faith that AI is being used to do, and some questionable things.
I’ll let you decide which is which.
Hearing Ancient Greek, Latin, and Aramaic spoken again
Equator AI has reconstructed what could be the sound of so-named “dead languages”. Interestingly enough, they used the gospel of John chapter 1 to reconstruct Ancient Greek, “In the beginning was the Word…” Click here to watch on Youtube.
2. South Korean Christians turn to AI for prayer
Song Jung-a and Christian Davies over at the Financial Times write,
Awake Corp, the developer of ChatGPT-based bible chatbot service Ask Jesus — now rebranded as Meadow — has since its launch in March attracted about 50,000 users, including 10,000 from outside Korea. The app has drawn Christians in Muslim countries such as Pakistan as well as in the US and other western countries.
The service responds to inquiries on spiritual matters and day-to-day issues with bible verses, interpretations and prayers.
3. Pulpit AI
Now, as a preacher, I’m going to come down hard and fast on anyone but the preacher writing the sermon he or she preaches. Pulpit AI is a little bit different. From their website:
Turn one sermon into unlimited content. Deepen engagement and resource your church with AI generated material taken from a single sermon.
A recording of a sermon is uploaded to the system. PulpitAI then transcribes the sermon into text and analyzes it to automatically create content like discussion questions, social media posts, daily devotionals, and the like. I’ve tested this out and am slightly interested. I think it prefers sermons that follow the “introduction - 3 point - conclusion” structure with one-line zingers interspersed throughout. I rarely (if ever) use that structure but PulpitAI seems to want to force it into that mold.
