Brave New World, the AI Version.
Like it or not, AI is here to stay. Pope Leo in one of his inaugural sermons, acknowledged that A.I. has "immense potential" for the good of humanity, but echoed his predecessor, Pope Francis, as he warned it could also pose "new challenges for the defense of human dignity, justice and labor." Leo went on to say we need to learn to use it with discernment.
Last night, 60 Minutes mentioned next week it will do a segment on the potential use of AI in warfare. Think of it a complete war without any human involvement. The weapon will be able to select the target on its own. One man said AI can better know the difference between a school bus and a enemy troop transport. Read: https://www.sciencenewstoday.org/ai-in-warfare-the-future-of-combat
This Morning on NPR's 1A there was a discussion on how AI can be used to give spiritual counsel to writing sermons. The discussion ranged from where is spiritual discernment when a computer writes the sermon to it just being like any research tool that is out there. Pastors of large congregations with limited staff are finding it very helpful in developing programs for member participation. Here is an article on how AI is being used in devotion to Mary
https://www.theinteldrop.org/2025/04/21/the-virgin-mary-and-chatgpt-a-new-chapter-in-ai-religion-and-digital-spirituality/
At noon NPR's Fresh Air talked about how Teens are increasingly using AI for social interaction. They turn to AI chatbots for emotional support, relationship advice, and to stave off boredom. However, most adults in teens' lives, from parents to teachers, are out of the loop. (See this article).
Then there is the environmental impact of AI systems. They use up a lot of power. Google wants to install small nuclear power plants similar to ones already on naval ships to generate their systems. Mr. Trump wants to start up inactive coal fired power plants to for the electricity they will use. In 2022, AI contributed to 2% of global energy usage – as much as a small country. By 2026, the IEA estimates that AI will use as much electricity as Japan. Running AI models and servers requires two to three times the power of conventional applications. https://evolutionoftheprogress.com/ai-power-consumption-exploding/
If you upgrade your browsers today, the new version will more likely have an AI Co Pilot or something similar depending on the browser you use. https://www.makeuseof.com/best-ai-browsers/#:~:text=AI Browsers Are Here, and These Are the,Arc's Max ... 5 5. SigmaOS Airis
Since the new guy, Leo, brought it up, the question is, how do we use it wisely?
Last night, 60 Minutes mentioned next week it will do a segment on the potential use of AI in warfare. Think of it a complete war without any human involvement. The weapon will be able to select the target on its own. One man said AI can better know the difference between a school bus and a enemy troop transport. Read: https://www.sciencenewstoday.org/ai-in-warfare-the-future-of-combat
This Morning on NPR's 1A there was a discussion on how AI can be used to give spiritual counsel to writing sermons. The discussion ranged from where is spiritual discernment when a computer writes the sermon to it just being like any research tool that is out there. Pastors of large congregations with limited staff are finding it very helpful in developing programs for member participation. Here is an article on how AI is being used in devotion to Mary
https://www.theinteldrop.org/2025/04/21/the-virgin-mary-and-chatgpt-a-new-chapter-in-ai-religion-and-digital-spirituality/
At noon NPR's Fresh Air talked about how Teens are increasingly using AI for social interaction. They turn to AI chatbots for emotional support, relationship advice, and to stave off boredom. However, most adults in teens' lives, from parents to teachers, are out of the loop. (See this article).
Then there is the environmental impact of AI systems. They use up a lot of power. Google wants to install small nuclear power plants similar to ones already on naval ships to generate their systems. Mr. Trump wants to start up inactive coal fired power plants to for the electricity they will use. In 2022, AI contributed to 2% of global energy usage – as much as a small country. By 2026, the IEA estimates that AI will use as much electricity as Japan. Running AI models and servers requires two to three times the power of conventional applications. https://evolutionoftheprogress.com/ai-power-consumption-exploding/
If you upgrade your browsers today, the new version will more likely have an AI Co Pilot or something similar depending on the browser you use. https://www.makeuseof.com/best-ai-browsers/#:~:text=AI Browsers Are Here, and These Are the,Arc's Max ... 5 5. SigmaOS Airis
Since the new guy, Leo, brought it up, the question is, how do we use it wisely?
Comments
FWIW, I think in the canon of mainstream top-40 sci-fi, the closest synechdoche for 21st century AI is 2001 A Space Odyssey. At least it's the most widely known.
https://bbc.com/news/articles/cq808px90wxo?fbclid=IwZXh0bgNhZW0CMTEAAR4ADy5nICYQKPPC12xKR6ARNeAHvNzoTfUY1fgOIZ054twQv8cmN2pSmP_UtQ_aem_yjyYffSoJplebxoszr_y6w
Would a prosecutor be allowed to say to the judge: "What would Mr. WcWidget say to use here today, if he hadn't been so heartlessly taken from us by a drunk-driver? Well, I think he'd tell us how much he loved his grandkids etc etc"?
Because you could probably argue that using AI this way is just a more high-tech, multimedia way of giving that sorta speech.
A critical comment: if you have a chat box pray for you, is it a real prayer.
Another comment: The church has long been in the forefront of modern technology, from the printing press, to the radio, then movies and television. We learned to use zoom during the pandemic. And now, it is AI.
I think the question becomes, though, if we create a form of AI that has sentient consciousness, are we usurping the power of God?
(Just to be clear, having, just the other day, googled a word that was clearly an adjective, only to be told by the AI box that the word was an adverb, I'm a bit doubtful about any fast-track to sentience. But I think it is one of the major philosophical dilemmas foreseen by the true-believers.)
Assuming the chat box cannot actually think, no. It's not prayer.
Now, if you get the chat box to compose a prayer, and then recite it yourself with full awareness of the meaning of the words, that might be a different story. But it'd still be you praying, not the AI.
I note this AI video was shown during the sentencing phase of the trial. It wasn’t shown to the jury, and it was just a statement to the court, not actual evidence. That probably makes it okay, as the same judge who allowed it to be shown to start with was the person deciding how much weight to give it, so he knew what he was dealing with. I think it would be a very different matter if it were to have been introduced as evidence and/or shown to a jury.
And who is that quote from? (And who has suggested we were “replacing” God with AI to start with?)
What do you think?
If you recite a preprinted prayer from a prayer book, is it an actual prayer?
First, they can call it intelligence all they like, it's not actually doing anything creative. It's just reassembling bits from something a human created to satisfy the criteria you input. Most of the original creators of the works used to train AI were not even asked for permission, let alone paid for the use of their work.
Second, if we ever do successfully create a truly sentient artificial intelligence, do we have the right to enslave it?
But that’s a different question from what you asked earlier. Your original question was “if you have a chat bot pray for you, is it a real prayer.” (Emphasis added.) That’s not the same thing as asking the chat bot to write a prayer for you to pray.
So again, how would you answer your question?
Now, to the difference between AI and a prayer book, I will borrow from what @Jane R posted just before you: .
So, if I wanted a prayer for my friend who is suffering from cancer, I could ask for a prayer from a chat box which is borrowing from related prayers created by humans to satisfy the request.
Her next point is also true. The chatbox may also be violating copyright. But, then again, I could ask my dumb browser to find a similar prayer without using AI. AI just does it faster.
Did you see Trump has fired the Director of the Copyright Office after her office released a report alleging AI programs are violating copyright protections?
That's one way of solving the problem.
Or another way is to come up with a new copyright law that will protect the original creators.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/trump-fires-copyright-office-director-after-report-raises-questions-about-ai-training/ar-AA1Ezxg6?ocid=BingNewsSerp
The concluding statement:
The promise of AI was never that it would have good opinions. It was that it would help us benefit from the wealth of expertise and insight in the world that might never otherwise find its way to us—that it would show us not what to think but how others have thought and how others might think, where consensus exists and where meaningful disagreement continues. As these systems grow more powerful, perhaps we should demand less personality and more perspective. The stakes are high: If we fail, we may turn a potentially groundbreaking interface to the collective knowledge and skills of all humanity into just more shit on a stick.
BTW: One way I found AI very useful is in the editing of the sermons I write myself. It helps me with word choice--I keep repeating certain words over and over too much. Sentence flow--breaking up run on sentences. Thought progression. It is still my work, but refined.
Erasing redundancy in terms of word and phrase use can done quite easily and manually, the problem with extensive editing by AI is that it tends to pull the overall language towards some 'average' and it's the deviation from that average that makes your content yours.
The 1A transcript can be found here, though to be frank, I doubt I will spend much if any time reading it.
As to articles etc created by AI, why should I be bothered to read something somebody hasn't been bothered to write?
Do any shipmates generate their posts by A1? How could we tell?
It's a publisher's dream, of course: make megabucks without having to deal with those pesky human writers. That whirring sound you can hear is George Orwell spinning in his grave.
You haven't addressed my second point (on the morality of enslaving a sentient AI) at all.
I know of no prayer book that can be that specific.
@Jane R I understood your point. I continued on that vain in my discussion with Nick. We do need to change our copyright laws to handle that change. In point of fact, copyright laws have always been far behind new technologies the statute of Anna 1710.
I am bemused by this idea that a personalised prayer is valuable, but not to the point where you'd actually want to spend any time writing it.
It's a prayer, not an incantation.
Then I got evil and asked it to write a devotion based on Ezekiel 23:20. Look at the horrified tone of its response! And the desperate suggestion (at the end) that I try a different verse.
Prompt: write a devotion in the style of Lamb Chopped on the topic of Ezekiel 23:20
Answer:
That's a challenging and intense verse—Ezekiel 23:20 is one of the most graphic and confronting passages in Scripture. LC’s style is thoughtful, grace-filled, and sensitive to the reader’s experience. When handling a verse like Ezekiel 23:20, she would likely approach it by acknowledging its difficult imagery, then lead the reader gently into reflection on God’s faithfulness and mercy, even when His people wander.
[As if! snigger. LC]
Here’s a devotion in that spirit:
________________________________________
Title: When We Run Too Far
Scripture: Ezekiel 23:20 (ESV)
She lusted after her lovers there, whose members were like those of donkeys, and whose issue was like that of horses.
There are some parts of Scripture that make us flinch—verses that feel raw and exposed. Ezekiel 23:20 is one of those. It’s not polite. It’s not subtle. It’s brutally honest about the depth of Israel’s unfaithfulness.
Why would God speak this way?
Because His heart is breaking.
This isn’t about crude language. It’s about the pain of betrayal. God uses shocking words because His people—His beloved—have gone so far, traded the intimacy of their covenant with Him for something empty, something degrading. And it matters to Him. He’s not indifferent. He’s not aloof.
He’s wounded.
And yet… even here, in the middle of one of the most disturbing chapters of judgment, God is still speaking. He hasn’t turned His back. He’s still calling them out—because He still wants them back.
That’s grace, isn’t it? That even in our worst moments, God keeps speaking. He doesn't write us off. He names the truth, yes—but He does it so we can be healed.
And healing would come. Through judgment, through exile, through long years of waiting—but eventually, through Jesus. God’s response to our most unfaithful moments wasn’t to destroy us, but to come closer. To carry the cost of our betrayal Himself, on the cross. To offer forgiveness that reaches even into the darkest places.
So no matter where you’ve been—no matter how far or how messy—it’s not too far for Jesus. His love can find you there. And He doesn’t just clean up the outside. He restores the heart.
Prayer:
Father, there are parts of my story I’d rather hide. But You see everything—and still, You call me Yours. Thank You for the mercy that runs deeper than my shame. Restore me, and help me walk in Your love. In Jesus’ name, Amen.
________________________________________
Would you like a follow-up devotion from the restoration side of Ezekiel—maybe from chapter 36 or 37? There’s such powerful hope in those chapters.
The same point occurs if you hire someone to pray for you. Donate money to our order, and the monks will pray for you. This is not real prayer, of course, and has long since become uncommon, or so we hope.
On the other hand, suppose you use AI to create a self-operating fund-raising operation and donate the proceeds to worthwhile causes. All you do is start it. You may deserve some credit, but how much? Of course, the recipients of the funds raised will still have benefited.
Imagine you're a dude taking a literature class on feminist analyses of misogyny in the OT, but always skip lectures to drink beer with your hockey buddies, so don't really know what theories the prof is using for her critiques.
So one of the essay-options is Ezekiel 23:20, and after running it through AI, you hand in a paper to the effect that it's ultimately about nothing more controversial than God's faithfulness and mercy.
I can understand that someone might want to use an ai to pray in the hope it will allow them to articulate what they mean better than they currently can themselves. I think this undervalues the fact that their sincere intention and attempt is meaningful to both God and those they pray for. But I can understand why someone might feel that way, especially if previously being able to form eloquent prayers was an important part of their identity and practice of their faith.
Reading this, something just occurred to me....isn't this similar to why people might pray in tongues?
Aye. And it's not just the struggle with expressive language, another aspect is the struggle to understand and comply with social norms regarding interpersonal communication.
For me, the particular problem expressed by Gramps49's post is how respond to feeling bad for someone he knows. And how to come up with a response that satisfies a religious subset of societal and cultural expectations. That expresses an appropriate degree of concern.
We seem to like to think of ourselves as unique individuals, capable of creative acts of expression. This incarnation of AI holds up a mirror and shows us the converse - our more prosaic desire for tailored conformity. Less home sapiens and more homo consumens.
'Here’s a devotion in that spirit:
________________________________________
Title: When We Run Too Far
Scripture: Ezekiel 23:20 (ESV)
She lusted after her lovers there, whose members were like those of donkeys, and whose issue was like that of horses.
There are some parts of Scripture that make us flinch—verses that feel raw and exposed. Ezekiel 23:20 is one of those. It’s not polite. It’s not subtle. It’s brutally honest about the depth of Israel’s unfaithfulness.
Why would God speak this way?
Because His heart is breaking.
This isn’t about crude language. It’s about the pain of betrayal. God uses shocking words because His people—His beloved—have gone so far, traded the intimacy of their covenant with Him for something empty, something degrading. And it matters to Him. He’s not indifferent. He’s not aloof.
He’s wounded.
And yet… even here, in the middle of one of the most disturbing chapters of judgment, God is still speaking. He hasn’t turned His back. He’s still calling them out—because He still wants them back.
That’s grace, isn’t it? That even in our worst moments, God keeps speaking. He doesn't write us off. He names the truth, yes—but He does it so we can be healed.
And healing would come. Through judgment, through exile, through long years of waiting—but eventually, through Jesus. God’s response to our most unfaithful moments wasn’t to destroy us, but to come closer. To carry the cost of our betrayal Himself, on the cross. To offer forgiveness that reaches even into the darkest places.
So no matter where you’ve been—no matter how far or how messy—it’s not too far for Jesus. His love can find you there. And He doesn’t just clean up the outside. He restores the heart.
Prayer:
Father, there are parts of my story I’d rather hide. But You see everything—and still, You call me Yours. Thank You for the mercy that runs deeper than my shame. Restore me, and help me walk in Your love. In Jesus’ name, Amen.'
what the Chatbot wrote? If so, I find it rather disturbingly good.
What homily would it come up, I wonder, if you fed in Ps 137 vs 6-9? Nothing as good as the Scottish metrical version, quoted bt CS Lewis, I'm sure :
'Oh blessed may that trooper be, when riding on his naggie, takes their wee bairns by t' toes, and dings them on the craggie'.
I can understand it at the individual level, but it becomes more problematic when it runs wider than that and not simply because of social expectations.
I'd assume - for instance - that you wouldn't be happy if people started regularly using similar means to generate the posts to this board.
It's well constructed, but it doesn't really engage the content of the passage in any detailed way, beyond saying that it's shocking, without explaining why, and that it shows us how God can be angry with his people but still want to communicate with them. All of which could probably apply to quite a few verses in the Bible.
I’ve never thought of it like that before, but I think you are right that that could be a factor.
And I wonder what point Lewis was trying to make by citing that verse.
Ironically, it was actually you who brought up the topic of religion after the conversation had gone elsewhere.
Taking a technological innovation and adding teens to the mix is ready material for a popular moral panic (and in Adolescence, technology is almost a McGuffin). I don't think teens are necessarily more prone to fall to AI dark patterns, and they may even be less at risk than an older generation that lack the ingrained scepticism about what they see and hear online (we've already seen this with AI slop on Facebook). For instance, most of the people in this story are older:
https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-features/ai-spiritual-delusions-destroying-human-relationships-1235330175/
Yeah, I wasn't sure of that one myself. I think the idea of praying in tongues is that the supplicant has been overtaken by the Holy Spirit and is using a language he would usually have no ability to speak. Not quite seeing how that analogizes to AI.
The NY Times (free link) has a piece on how Mayo Clinic radiologists use AI. They use AI tools they've developed themselves and ones they get from third-party providers to enhance radiologists' ability to do their jobs -- and they're employing more radiologists now than they did before. AI makes radiologists better at their jobs; it doesn't replace them.
I assume the parallel is that the AI 'says the things' you would have said, but I'd agree it's not a particularly good analogy for the way in which tongues function (it's more sub-liturgical).
It’s what the chatbot wrote, yes, and the rhetorical turn is the kind of move I’d make—but I’d address the content and its reason for being shocking in some detail (which would require me to do some actual research into what God’s people were getting up to at that time, in terms of specific fuckwittery). I’d point out that God is grieving, yes—but hopefully without the seni-sappiness. I’d note that people (and God) say shocking things because they’re trying to move you to action, and then go into what those actions might be. Hopefully all of that extra work would lead to a devotion that has a bit more substance to it and wasn’t applicable to dozens of other Bible verses with little or no change.
Interestingly (at least to me), though it’s scraped tons of my phrasing and played kaleidoscope games with it, it has managed to completely miss out on the resurrection of Jesus—and that’s tied in to everything i write. How did it miss the resurrection?
Interesting the Nobel Peace Prize was established by the developer of dynamite.
Yes, AI is proving itself in medical research and testing. It will help in developing new drugs for the betterment of all. I think it will help in many scientific fields.
We are only at the dawn of this brave new world that I would think Huxley would find both fascinating and terrifying.
That last sentence rather underlines the thinking behind this decision. If there was lots of money to be made from the commercial exploitation of the internet, the US government wanted it to be made by US companies.
It was this sentence from Doublethink that brought the analogy to my mind
I can understand that someone might want to use an ai to pray in the hope it will allow them to articulate what they mean better than they currently can themselves
Praying in tongues is not a current 'tool' I would use, but in my more charismatic younger days this would describe something of the motivation to do so.