AI, Ministry, and Self-Deception
Photo by Teslariu Mihai on Unsplash
In the 1993 film Jurassic Park, Jeff Goldblum’s character criticizes the scientists who create the new dinosaurs. They achieved the scientific breakthrough without the “discipline” required to make the breakthrough themselves. The speech ends with the famous line, “Your scientists were so preoccupied with whether or not they could that they didn’t stop to think if they should.” As we step into new technologies, these lines seemingly become prescient.
As Artificial Intelligence (AI) becomes more and more a part of everyday life, the church faces diverse opinions on how much it should be welcomed into our doors. Many others have written extensively trying to argue whether or not we “should” embrace this technology. I attended a recent event that addressed AI in the church, both its usefulness and words of caution. More thorough theological examinations are available elsewhere, including in Firebrand (see Peter Bellini’s Sanctifying Silicon and Baptizing Bots).
It is unrealistic to think we can completely eliminate AI use in the church. One of my email platforms recently began automatically summarizing long emails using AI. Passive AI use is already common. AI can provide helpful tools. I often use AI to develop a reading plan for book studies. However, one small yet significant danger has been overlooked. AI potentially enables a new self-deception that, even when used in church settings for seemingly holy reasons, separates us further from God.
Soren Kierkegaard created a theological understanding of despair in his work The Sickness Unto Death. According to Kierkegaard, despair is the worst fate for a Christian. Death brings resurrection. Despair, however, brings a sickness that drives us deeper away from God without finding resurrection. For Kierkegaard, we despair when we are not who we truly are before God. Kierkegaard offers several dialectics (humans are finite and infinite, temporary and eternal, etc.). Faith roots us in who we truly are and sets us before God, therefore resolving our despair.
Kierkegaard’s model is complex with far-reaching implications, which this article does not claim to address. Yet at the core is this idea: self-deception drives us to despair and away from faith.
Scripture also warns us of the sinful nature of self-deception. 1 John 1:8 warns about deceiving ourselves and thinking we are without sin. The parable of the Pharisee and Tax Collector in Luke 18, while often cited as a story of humility, involves self-deception on the part of the Pharisee. When we deceive ourselves to think more highly of ourselves than we ought, we separate ourselves from God.
A recent presentation I attended highlighted many uses for AI in ministry. Why spend the time and energy reading difficult theological texts? Instead, use AI to summarize them and insert quotes into your sermon. Pastors no longer need to spend the time and energy improving their writing. Instead, feed your notes into AI and let AI compose a high-quality sermon. Many pastors struggle with the right words to say in a pastoral counselling situation. AI can provide automated responses that give the impression of empathy. AI can craft liturgy that the pastor does not have to write. A musician with little musical talent can use AI to craft a catchy worship song. You may pastor a small church without high-quality equipment, but you take video of your sermon and run it through an AI program that will improve the quality and make small clips that compare with the mega-church pastor down the road.
These are certainly not the only uses for AI. Yet they all share a common theme. They are all rooted in self-deception. All these uses allow a pastor to pretend to be more educated, more talented, or serving a bigger church than the pastor actually is. Do these tools really make more disciples of Jesus Christ? Likely not. Instead, they feed the part of our ego that is tied to pastoral performance. By appearing to be better-read, more talented, and pastoring a bigger church, we feed our ego with self-deception. This self-deception always drives us further from God and into despair.
Self-deception in church leaders did not begin with AI. Yet AI positions itself as a tool that can be used to improve pastors, allowing self-deception on a scale not yet seen. Rather than taking a sermon from someone else, we are now using a tool to develop a sermon (which is largely based on someone else’s work). The participation in using AI, as well as its ability to pull from enough sources to make the borrowing of ideas less obvious, enables us to deceive ourselves into thinking we are using these tools for the best.
Pastors face the temptation to believe that our value is in the quality of our presentation rather than our faithfulness to God. In this presumptive framework, more intellectual ability is better than less. Bigger churches are better than smaller churches. Eloquent preaching is better than ministry of presence or authenticity. It is exactly in this framework that self-deception thrives. Living into this framework in its extreme form leads to a Messiah complex—the idea that the success of the church depends entirely on the quality of the pastor. This leaves no room for the gospel message or the Holy Spirit. AI tools that artificially “improve” the work of the pastor in this paradigm are not just helpful; they become necessary. According to this paradigm, the more eloquent wording of a sermon may convince someone to make a commitment to Christ, and the AI-enhanced video of a pastor’s sermon, complete with Industrial Light and Magic-style special effects, may bring more people to church. Reliance on AI perpetuates this paradigm.
Unfortunately, this path leads to despair. By fueling our self-deception, we are not, to paraphrase Kierkegaard, being our true selves before God. That separation of self-deception leads to despair, not more effective ministry. Self-deception urges us to see success and failure, often defined by numbers, as a result of our effort and talent. We rely more on technology to uphold a false image of ourselves than the Holy Spirit to work through us.
Artificial Intelligence gives the form of perfection without the substance. We cannot use AI in this way and pass John Wesley’s first question of self-examination: “Am I consciously or unconsciously creating the impression that I am better than I really am? In other words, am I a hypocrite?”
The Apostle Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 13:1-2, “If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging symbol. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing” (NIV). With AI tools, we can speak in the tongues of men, and fathom knowledge. However, AI cannot increase the love or faithfulness of a pastor.
God calls pastors to more than quality. He calls pastors to obedience. Faithfully serving a smaller church where God has called a pastor to serve should not be hidden through AI tools, but celebrated. The benefit from reading a challenging theological text comes not just in the ability to impress others by quoting it in a sermon, but in the pastor’s prayerful work in reading and absorbing the text. A sermon inspired by the Holy Spirit will always triumph over a perfectly crafted AI manuscript. An AI-driven response programmed to sound empathetic is manipulative and infinitely inferior to a pastor’s presence in a time of need.
The pervasive threat of self-deception from AI use by pastors forces us into a deeper conversation. Rather than asking whether we can use AI to improve our output as pastors, we need to address why we look to these tools. What purpose do they serve? Will the improved AI output make new disciples for Jesus Christ, or will it feed the ego of the pastor? What might the pastor gain by engaging in the difficult task instead of delegating it to an AI tool?
It is likely impossible to keep AI out of ministry altogether. AI may be helpful for some tasks. However, pastors and ministry leaders must take great care when using AI, not just asking if we can use it, but if we should.
Jonathan Hanover is an Elder in the Global Methodist Church.