Opportunities and Threats of Artificial Intelligence in Christian Ministry: An Interdisciplinary Approach Through the Lens of Scientific Exploration and Technology

Artificial intelligence (AI) applications are everywhere, including within churches and other faith communities. Churches are complex systems, and the incorporation of new people and things over the lifetime of these communities changes them. New technology, in general, and AI tools in specific are no exception. In Christian ministry, innovation is no stranger: witness how quickly churches adopted online worship during the COVID-19 pandemic. Given that AI is already present in the complex system of churches, care must be taken to assess the opportunities and threats associated with its intentional adoption before doing so. This report advocates for ministry to make use of an approach borrowed from scientific exploration for the evaluation of opportunities and threats and for managing the process of introducing and managing new elements into a complex system: systems engineering (SE) principles and processes. SE methodology enables scientific exploration in environments that are difficult to explore due to danger, cost or technological immaturity by rigorously managing the development, introduction and life cycle of technology that will be used in the complex system of exploration. Such an approach would be promising for increasing the safety of a technology that comes with some inherent danger, easing its integration into church operation, mission, formation and worship and in turn allowing ministry leaders agency in determining the future of their relationship with artificial intelligence.