by | Jul 14, 2023 | Uncategorized
Generative AI and the rise of ‘Bible GPTs’ could radically shape our engagement with Scripture.
The pace of adoption for artificial intelligence is unprecedented.
By the end of January, ChatGPT—an AI chatbot that generates brand original content when prompted—had logged 100 million visitors to its site. Before that, it reached 1 million users in the first five days after its release in late November. By comparison, Instagram took 2.5 months to reach 1 million users, and Facebook 10 months.
Generative AI systems like ChatGPT, which can produce humanlike responses to users’ prompts, will undoubtedly shape how we, as the Book of Common Prayer puts it, “read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest” the Scriptures. Indeed, there are already multiple tailor-made AI-driven chatbot systems being used for Bible engagement—which I’ve dubbed “BibleGPTs”—including IlluminateBible.com, SiliconScripture.org, Bible.ai, and OpenBible.info’s AI-assisted Bible Study.
As a digital theology expert, I believe these kinds of “BibleGPTs” will continue to advance, proliferate, and eventually become proprietary systems. And as this happens, the church and its leaders will be prompted to make some momentous decisions about the Christian canon. This will, in turn, influence how we interpret the Bible and impact the future of our faith and practice.
AI-led Scripture engagement will generate new problems.
First, BibleGPTs could reify what I call “concentric canons.” Their databases will require us to precisely define what writings are included in our Christian traditions.
Scripture is our primary canon. When handwritten scrolls became recognized as distinct books, the early church fathers confirmed which writings were considered canon and which …
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by | Jul 14, 2023 | Uncategorized
More Americans are staying put. But how can we live with intention?
Our church’s lament service took place in March; we had moved to Cincinnati the previous summer. I didn’t attend the service with my own sadness in mind—but it found me, in the dark and somber silence consecrated for those who showed up. The grief of our recent uprooting caught up with me in the pew that late winter night. Leaving home, even voluntarily, incurs a litany of losses.
I might have believed the COVID-19 pandemic contributed to an increase in geographical mobility, as companies—like my husband’s—sold their headquarters and opted for a fully remote workforce. Such flexibility allowed us to relocate to care for an aging parent, and the majority of Americans still report the desire to work from home full-time (while only 13 percent do).
Recent data, however, reveals that for four decades, geographical mobility has been on the decline in the United States. Although pandemic disruptions led to an initial increase in dislocation (often from urban areas to suburban or rural ones), these numbers have stabilized. More Americans are staying put.
Perhaps our national appetite for transience is waning. Still, I confess to feeling pessimistic about our collective commitment to geographical rootedness and responsibility. In our new telework, telehealth, telechurch environments, it seems nearly as easy to opt out of belonging to a place as it is to opt in. With socially mediated lives, there aren’t immediate and acute absences to fill if you change your address. With remote work arrangements, there are fewer opportunities to make new friends. In fact, what’s curious to me, in comparing our move in 2022 with that in 2011, is how little stands to change despite a change in geographical …
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by | Jul 13, 2023 | Uncategorized
“Unless Jesus returns we face a catastrophic future.”
Sometimes, late at night, when her kids have gone to bed and Eleanor Getson is doing the dishes, she is hit with an almost crippling fear.
“Glaciers melting. Islands of plastic in the Pacific Ocean. Forest fires wiping out millennia of history,” said Getson, a 40-year-old evangelical living in Bradford, England, with her husband and two boys. “I can’t stop scrolling through stories about climate change. … It’s too much to think about, and I get this anxiety about what my children will suffer because of us.”
That’s why Getson was delighted to hear the news that the Church of England, which she grew up in, has made the momentous decision to divest from fossil fuels. Last month, the Anglican Church Commissioners and Pensions Board announced its decision to pull all financial investments from gas and oil companies because of the way burning fossil fuels is driving climate change.
Pressure on the Church of England to divest from fossil fuel companies has been building for several years, as an increasing number of clergy, bishops, and dioceses have made divestment commitments and called for fossil-free pension schemes.
Among them have been evangelicals bringing their own distinctive arguments and motivations to the campaign. For years, evangelically inclined organizations like Operation Noah, Tearfund, United Society Partners in the Gospel (USPG) and Christian Aid have been calling for the Church of England to fully divest from fossil fuel companies
Ruth Valerio, director of advocacy and influencing at Tearfund, a Christian relief and development organization based in the UK, told CT that the church has a huge role in calling on policies and practices that do not harm the natural world, …
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by | Jul 13, 2023 | Uncategorized
How God pursued me even when I was certain I’d already found truth.
On a warm summer’s day in 1991, I sat in Amaravati Buddhist Monastery, a temple north of London, my heart full of confusion and inner turmoil. I had begun seriously to doubt my faith.
It didn’t make sense. I thought I had found the truth in Buddhism and had given up everything necessary to become a Buddhist nun seven years earlier. In the temple led by American monk Ajahn Sumedho, life was strict and disciplined, involving many ascetic practices designed to simplify daily existence and help us detach from earthly things. Our lives were based around meditation practice; we were celibate, slept little, and ate only one meal a day. I was known for my strong faith in Buddhism, and had not ever really doubted the purpose of living by its teachings.
Until now.
Suddenly I found myself, with my shaven head and robe, spontaneously rushing down to the traditional Anglican church in the nearby village. “I’ve got to talk to somebody, I’ve got to understand what’s happening to me,” I thought.
Upon entering, I looked around anxiously for the priest. “Could you pray for me, please?” I asked when I spotted him. “I’m very confused.” Unfazed, he graciously guided me to the Holy Communion rail and asked me to kneel. He laid his hands on my shoulders and prayed. As he did so, I broke down sobbing uncontrollably.
As the tears abated, the priest’s compassionate eyes met mine, and he said, “We need to talk.” We agreed to meet the following week.
After being prayed for, I felt a great release of the emotions and conflict deep inside of me. I was expectant that this man of God might be able to help me. How things had changed from my certainty about Buddhism to barely …
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by | Jul 13, 2023 | Uncategorized
“The Office” star offers a welcome critique of privatized faith. His other ideas are harder to swallow.
I promised myself only one The Office reference in a review of Soul Boom: Why We Need a Spiritual Revolution, written by Rainn Wilson, the actor who portrays Dwight Schrute on the show. So here goes: In season five , Dwight and his longtime girlfriend, Angela, the most religious person on the show, break up. Dwight is crushed and confides to a coworker, “She introduced me to so many things. Pasteurized milk, sheets, monotheism, presents on your birthday, preventative medicine.”
Where Dwight was a latecomer to the merits of monotheism, Rainn Wilson has made promoting it a major part of his life’s calling, bending his significant celebrity and resources to projects that promote human spirituality in media, entertainment, and social activism. Soul Boom is his latest effort and, despite its shortcomings, is one of the most compelling non-Christian apologetical works I have read.
Anticipating shared values
Wilson is a member of the Baha’i faith, a religion introduced in the 19th century by Baháʼu’lláh (1817–1892), who claimed to receive a new revelation that, roughly speaking, placed him in the genealogy of “Manifestations of God” stretching back to Abraham and including Krishna, Zoroaster, Buddha, Jesus Christ, and Muhammad. The religion now claims around six million followers globally.
The teachings of Baháʼu’lláh, as well as his son and grandson and the Universal House of Justice, the faith’s governing body since 1963, are quite ecumenical. For starters, they draw widely from world religions to form the basis of their teachings. In addition—and more provocatively, at least from this Christian’s perspective—the faith rejects the …
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