by Rachelle McCalla, First United Presbyterian Church, Atlantic, Iowa. Delivered at the Ecumenical Roundtable, Chicago, April 20, 2024.
James 3: 1-13
I’m not going to lie, when I asked ChatGPT to write the opening prayer for our service this morning, I was prepared to laugh and roll my eyes at whatever inappropriate nonsense it might generate. But given the prompt, “write an opening prayer for a science and faith meeting,” the AI-powered word generator provided me with something which I found to be not only perfectly usable, but honestly better than what I had been struggling to come up with myself.
Is it safe to admit here that I often struggle to compose corporate prayers? There’s a weight to it, the felt burden of carrying the entire worshiping body’s deepest needs before God — of getting it right for everyone, the thinkers and the feelers, the whole-hearted believers, as well as the sceptics.
All that pressure can be paralyzing, but ChatGPT didn’t seem to be burdened by any of it. The words appeared quickly, after only the slightest pause. How are we to feel about this? Grateful? Jealous? Perhaps a little scared?
Is it appropriate to use generated words in worship? God created us to worship — what happens when we outsource that task? What is at stake?
For the record, I did not use any AI to compose any of the rest of this message or any of the remainder of the worship service. The prayer was one thing — being people of science, we needed to be able to observe directly what we’re talking about when we talk about artificial intelligence and the faith.
This is uncharted territory. We are paving the path as we walk it and the stones we set down can help us move forward or lead us astray. I know you already know this, but — there aren’t any Bible verses about artificial intelligence, and I have been second-guessing my periscope this entire time.
If we focus our concerns about AI primarily on the text-generating applications, then James really does have a lot to say on the subject. He uses the tongue as synecdoche, a kind of metonym in which this 3-inch pliant organ represents all forms of communication: spoken, written, verbal and non-verbal. Books had not yet been invented when these words were written, yet we apply this teaching to them and all forms of communication, from angry 3:00 a.m. emails that can get you fired, to yes, words generated by artificial intelligence. All of it summed up in this one word: the tongue.
The tongue means communication and further, that in communication — whether words of blessing or curse, words of praise or destruction — the words which come forth from us serve as a barometer for our inmost souls.
Can both fresh water and salt water flow from the same spring? Of course not, and one worse — if we mix sweet and salt, the salt will make the sweet salty, not vice-versa. Destructive words overwhelm all the sweet words we’ve ever spoken — we see this time and again when persons in power are brought low by a few hateful words, no matter how many perfectly-crafted speeches they have delivered before. The kind of water that flows from a spring, is and can only ever be precisely whatever kind of water is in the spring.
How does AI make words? According to the info page at openai.com, the model is trained using reinforcement learning, collecting comparison data and ranking the responses. One major critique of the outcome is that, while the resulting verbiage often sounds good, it’s often, well, wrong. This is particularly alarming to those who work in specific scientific specialties, where AI-generated “information” is cluttering up the real information.
For example, the mushroom-identification group I belong to online, has warned their members not to trust any source, whether online or in print, created since the proliferation of AI-generated texts, because, quite simply, AI may tell you it’s safe to eat a mushroom that will in fact kill you dead.
The water that flows from a spring can only ever be whatever water is in the spring, and if we mix sweet and salty, the result, however diluted, will still be salty, and drinking salt-water, too, can be deadly.
To quote openai.com, “ChatGPT sometimes writes plausible-sounding but incorrect or nonsensical answers. Fixing this issue is challenging, as, during Reinforcement Learning training, there is currently no source of truth.”
James opens our reading this morning with the warning, “Not many of you should become teachers, my fellow believers, because you know that we who teach will be judged more strictly.” There’s a lot going on in that single sentence. At its heart, it tells us words matter. More than that, we see in these words a glimpse of the deeper reality.
To be a teacher implies we have followers, we have sheep who we shepherd, and the notion of being judged more strictly rests on the reality that we are not just responsible for our own words, choices, and actions, but also the words, choices, and actions of others which result from our teaching.
We are paving the path as we walk it and the stones we set down can help us move forward or lead us astray, and furthermore, it matters, not just here and now, but for all eternity.
What is truth?
In the prayer generated by ChatGPT, we prayed together, “Grant us the wisdom to seek truth in all its forms,” and this comes from a model whose creators openly confess their product currently has no source of truth.
“What is truth?” Pilate asked Jesus in John 18:38, but no response from Jesus is recorded.
Are we then to conclude, as with the abrupt ending of Mark’s gospel, that it is on us, that the unspoken answers are for us to live into?
Earlier in John’s gospel, Jesus says, “I am the way, the truth, and the life.”
And there’s a part of me that wants to say, as long as we have Jesus, as long as we are seeking Jesus, it doesn’t really matter what tools we use to get there.
We use screens and sound systems in our worship services, we use printers and organs and keyboards and electronic drum sets, with volume control thank God, we use tools and instruments to praise God, we use spell check and copy-paste and yes, sometimes even auto-fill. And what is AI if not another tool in our toolkit?
When Jesus entered Jerusalem, according to Luke 19, as the crowds were singing his praises and the Pharisees said “Teacher, rebuke your disciples,” Jesus responded, “I tell you if they keep quiet the stones will cry out.”
If stones can praise God, maybe artificial intelligence can, too?
Jesus’ words hearken back to Habakkuk 2:11, where we’re told the stones of the wall will cry out, and Habakkuk 2:14 concludes, “For the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the LORD as the waters cover the sea.”
And if AI can help us proliferate that knowledge, maybe instead of being so critical we should just say thank-you?
Maybe we should work on working together with the tool we created to help it do a better job. Like the water in a spring, what we put into the algorithm determines what comes out of the algorithm. Is there a source of truth we can put into AI so that we can draw out truth from it?
If stones can praise God, maybe AI can too
I ask because humanity, as a species, as God’s special creation, is either one of two things. We are either a static creation, going nowhere, or else, we are on a trajectory together, moving towards … something.
We see hints in the Bible, that the latter option may be the correct one. Jesus prayed for his disciples in John 17:20-21, Jesus said, “My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me.”
Jesus’ prayer for us suggests many things, three of which are particularly relevant here. One: whatever our current status, it can’t possibly be the perfected end goal or Jesus wouldn’t have to pray for us to have greater unity. Two: the message leads to belief, and belief matters, therefore the message matters. Our words matter. And three: if and when we do achieve unity in Christ, then the world will believe that Christ was sent of God the Father. And maybe then the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the LORD as the waters cover the sea.
Can the technology of Artificial Intelligence help us on this trajectory to greater unity in Christ? I believe it’s possible, but I also believe it depends greatly on how it is used. Previous technologies have rocked humanity and the church. The invention of the printing press in 1440 likely contributed to the Reformation which divided the church. The invention of the internet may have connected humanity in new and unique ways, but it also coincides with the fastest drop in the rates of faith profession that we have known in the history of Christianity.
Movements that rock the world, rock the church as well. AI will certainly be no different. It’s going to throw up bigger waves than we have seen yet, but can we ride those waves to greater good or will they wash us completely away? What kind of technology is artificial intelligence?
To be fair, I have read responses from customer-service chatbots that made it sound as though the automated messenger had completed more than one unit of CPE. Literally doing more effective pastoral care than I can muster on some days.
And writing more moving prayers than I can produce when my well is running dry. It’s enough to make a minister wonder if we, too, might someday be replaced by machines.
James says in 3:8, “no human being can tame the tongue,” and the traditional clapback is that maybe we can’t but surely the Holy Spirit can.
What if we use AI, not as the be-all and end-all and certainly not an idol and end in itself, but, like bumper-bowling, to keep us out of the gutters? Because auto-generated words will likely be better than whatever we can produce when we’re frazzled and fed-up and all but finished.
The simple truth is, as the prayer we prayed together demonstrated, the tool we humans created together is capable of producing beautiful words. The machine may never surpass our greatest, most spirit-filled prayers, but it is still better than whatever poison we may spout in times of anger and weakness.
As we’ve been reminded so many times at so many weddings, “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.” (I Cor. 13:1)
Artificial Intelligence can speak in our tongues, and sometimes, it can even imitate love, especially when our own fountains are running dry. But until we create a machine that can actually love, I don’t think we have to worry about machines becoming ministers.
If we who teach the faith are to be judged more strictly, first and foremost we must know the truth, which is to say, we must know Jesus, who is the way, the truth, and the life. As long as AI has no source of truth, it cannot really replace us.
When I sit down to write a prayer, I feel burdened, but that burden is the weight of love. And if God is love, then that love is more important than the words we use, because even the most perfect words are nothing without love, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
