I have ADHD, and AI has revolutionised how I approach research, manage tasks, and train my attention towards things that matter to me. If technology can help me engage more deeply with something I care about, why wouldn’t I explore what it could offer prayer, Scripture, or life in a church community?
Can Technology Deepen Christian Spirituality?
We already accept quite a lot of help when we pray. We read words somebody else wrote, listen to music, light candles, and look at images. A prayer book gives us language when we struggle to find our own. An audio Bible lets us hear a passage while walking.
AI can answer back, and we have to decide how much to trust its response. I’m interested in whether that back-and-forth helps someone stay with a passage or pray in their own words. I’d also want to understand what it changes about the practice along the way.
John’s Gospel introduces Jesus as the Word who became flesh and lived among us (John 1:14). In the Gospels, he eats with people, touches the sick, and gets tired. For me, that makes it difficult to imagine Christian spirituality as something we do by getting our bodies and their needs out of the way. The person praying has a particular body, a particular mind, and circumstances that affect how they pray.
Technology, Disability and Accessible Worship
Take the expectation that prayer happens best when we sit still in silence. That can be a helpful practice, but I wouldn’t assume that difficulty with it tells us much about someone’s desire for God. A person might find it easier to listen to a Psalm while walking, or follow a short guided prayer. A reminder on their phone might help them return to prayer during the week.
The same applies when we gather. Captions and transcripts can make a sermon accessible to someone who cannot hear it or needs more time to process what was said. Speech-to-text could help someone prepare the prayers they will lead. A member living with chronic illness might be able to lead a small prayer group by video even when travelling to the church building is difficult.
I’m drawn to that last possibility because it changes who gets to contribute. In 1 Corinthians 12, Paul describes a church whose members need one another and whose gifts belong to the whole body. If our arrangements make it difficult for someone to take part, the congregation also misses out on what they bring. So I’d want the conversation about technology to begin with the people facing those barriers. They may have a much simpler idea than whatever the church was about to buy.
Using Virtual Reality for Christian Prayer
Then there is the idea of putting on a headset to pray, which admittedly takes a little more getting used to. Imagine being unable to travel to a retreat, but having access to a headset and a guided time of prayer in a quiet virtual chapel. You hear a Gospel passage, sit with it, and have time to pray without the programme constantly moving you on to the next thing.
The Church of England’s 2022 Prayers at the Foot of the Cross, filmed at Bristol Cathedral, brought prayer, choral music, and silence into a 360-degree service viewable with or without a headset.
I can also see a connection with Ignatian imaginative prayer, where someone pictures themselves within a Gospel scene and attends to Jesus. A virtual setting might give a person a way into that practice. Of course, a designer would be deciding what the scene looked and sounded like, so we would need to recognise those details as an interpretation. A convincing reconstruction could easily make us forget how much has been imagined.
A headset may be distracting or uncomfortable for some people, and an audio recording may work better. I’d ask those who try it what helped them pray and what got in the way.
How AI Can Help with Bible Study
AI interests me for a slightly different reason: you can keep asking it to explain something. If an answer assumes knowledge you don’t have, you can ask it to go back a step. You can compare interpretations, work through unfamiliar terms, or break a large research task into something you can actually begin.
Given the difference AI has made to my own research, I can see why this would be useful to someone opening a biblical commentary and wondering whether they need another book just to understand the first one. They might ask for an explanation of the argument, then return to the commentary with a clearer idea of what the author is saying. They could also bring a more specific question to their Bible study group.
I would be careful about letting the answer end the enquiry, though. AI can produce plausible explanations and references that turn out to be wrong. With theology, there is also the question of whose interpretation it has presented as obvious. Asking where an idea comes from, checking the source, and reading a different view are part of using it well. I want to come away better able to read the passage and judge an interpretation for myself.
Using AI to Write Sermons
For someone preparing to preach, that help can extend into the writing itself. A minister could give AI their notes and argument, ask for a first draft, and work through the result. It might suggest a structure they hadn’t considered or help untangle a paragraph that looks fine on the page but sounds dreadful aloud. Tools such as Logos’s Sermon Assistant already offer help with outlines, illustrations, applications, and discussion questions.
I can understand why people hesitate here. Working out what to say is part of coming to understand a passage. If a preacher skips that process and delivers an argument they have barely considered, the congregation may hear something polished that its speaker cannot really explain. There is also the congregation itself to consider. A sermon on forgiveness will be heard differently by someone recovering from abuse, and a fluent draft may fail to recognise what its advice would ask of that person.
Also, it’s worth noting there is no substitute for the Spirit. A good preacher labours over the text and submits it to God. Technology will always have its limits. But I wonder if occasionally the Spirit can even work through code.
I think AI could help write a sermon if the preacher can explain and take responsibility for the final words. Quotations need checking, invented stories cannot become personal testimony, and substantial AI involvement ought to be acknowledged. Private pastoral conversations also need to stay private; they aren’t material to casually paste into a prompt.
There are useful possibilities after Sunday as well. St John’s Cathedral in Brisbane is exploring AI in ministry, including devotional material and ways of sharing sermons with reflection questions and captions. A checked, plain-language summary could help a group return to a difficult sermon during the week. I like the possibility of giving people more time with an idea, especially when hearing it once wasn’t enough.
AI, Mental Health and Pastoral Care
Someone struggling to contact a pastor, friend, or counsellor might ask AI to help organise what they want to say. They can read the draft, change it, and decide whether it says enough to begin the conversation. For someone who keeps putting off that first message, having a few sentences to work with could help.
Healthdirect explains how online services can connect people with mental health support, while advising that AI should not replace professional care. A church can help someone find a qualified counsellor and make room for prayer and friendship alongside that care. A quiet video conversation may also be easier to manage than a crowded gathering for someone who is struggling.
I’ve written before about knowing and being known. If AI helps someone put words to what they are going through, I’d hope it also becomes easier to share that with a person they trust. Someone who knows them can stay in touch over time and ask how things are going. A video call might make that possible during a week when meeting in person is too much.
For a church wanting to try some of this, I’d start with a conversation: what are people finding difficult, and what would they like help with? Let them help decide what happens next, then give them time to try it. I’d want to hear from the person who joined the discussion, or found a way of praying they wanted to keep.
