Faith, Algorithms, and the Future: Why AI's Embrace by Evangelical and Pentecostal Churches Demands Scrutiny
The rapid advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AI) is transforming nearly every aspect of human life, and religious communities are no exception. Far from being isolated, Evangelical and Pentecostal/Charismatic Churches (EPCCs) around the world are increasingly engaging with AI, not just as passive users but often as active developers and promoters. This embrace stems from a long-standing tradition of adopting technological innovation as part of their core mission to "make disciples of all the nations". However, as EPCCs integrate AI into their spiritual practices and church life, this powerful union of faith and algorithms presents both significant opportunities and profound ethical and theological challenges that warrant careful scrutiny.
To understand this complex interaction, it’s crucial to grasp the concept of the "digital habitus." This term describes how digital culture shapes our thoughts, actions, desires, and perceptions, effectively classifying individuals based on their online preferences and behaviors. In this digital world, every action and piece of content we produce online can be "datafied" – turned into data points that AI can analyze. EPCCs, in a quest to remain relevant in contemporary digital culture, have readily adopted this digital habitus. Pastors and leaders, many of whom are "digital natives," see a vast new "mission field of unreached digital tribes" ripe for outreach. This openness to technology is often rooted in a "sacramental justification," viewing technologies like AI as pathways that "open new opportunities to encounter the divine," as evangelist Billy Graham once foresaw with mass media. Their approach is often a blend of hope, entrepreneurial spirit, and pragmatism.
Yet, this optimistic view coexists with a darker, eschatological interpretation among many EPCCs. They see the rise of AI as a sign of the "end times," fearing its potential to facilitate global control and massive deceptions, possibly even enabling the emergence of an "antichrist" through sophisticated computer graphics and viral fake news. Despite this tension between hopeful engagement and apocalyptic fear, the driving force for EPCCs remains their Christian mission, compelling them to utilize "whatever means necessary" to spread their message.
To classify how EPCCs interact with AI, a threefold framework is helpful:
Religion in AI: This involves EPCCs actively contributing to the design, development, and promotion of AI technologies that align with their specific values, priorities, and practices.
AI in Religion: This refers to EPCCs interacting with and utilizing existing AI technologies for their religious purposes.
Religion of AI: This describes how interpretations of AI technologies themselves become intertwined with religious fears and beliefs, often leading to dystopian prophecies based on end-times interpretations.
We can see these interactions play out in three critical areas of EPCCs’ spirituality: the pursuit of sexual purity, the centrality of Bible reading, and the spread of spiritual revivals.
AI and the Pursuit of Sexual Purity: A Double-Edged Sword
For EPCCs, sexual purity is a significant concern, with pornography viewed as a major threat and a form of adultery. To combat this, many Christian entrepreneurs have developed AI-based solutions for Digital Pornography Detection (DPD). These applications aim to protect believers by automatically detecting and filtering sexually explicit content from digital images, videos, and texts.
At its core, DPD involves sophisticated AI algorithms, often using Convolutional Neural Networks (CNNs), to analyze digital content. This process typically includes segmenting images to find skin tones, geometrically modeling body parts, identifying specific features like nipples or sexual organs, and then classifying the material as pornographic. For videos, motion detection and sound analysis are added layers of detection.
However, the effectiveness and ethics of these DPD systems are highly contentious. A major problem lies in the training data used for these AI algorithms. These systems learn what constitutes "pornographic" by being trained on vast databases of annotated images, like ImageNet. The source highlights a critical flaw: these datasets are often "riddled with biases, most notably biases about sex, gender, and sexuality," and once embedded, "biased data will always produce biased results". Concerns include images scraped from websites without consent, annotations crowdsourced globally (introducing cultural biases), and the inclusion of content that misrepresents women, perpetuates harmful stereotypes, or sexualizes and fetishizes certain racial groups.
Despite these ethical issues, which are often "overlooked by the urge to control the pornographic plague" in EPCCs, Christian DPD software companies, like Covenant Eyes (CE), Accountable2You, and Ever Accountable, continue to grow in the market. A particularly worrying aspect is the "digital accountability" feature in many of these apps, which tracks a user's online activities, credit card payments, and blocked content, reporting it to a "trusted" partner, family member, pastor, or counselor. This form of surveillance, especially in EPCCs known for their strictness, can create abusive environments, particularly for vulnerable LGBTQI+ Christians. Furthermore, the continuous emergence of "adversarial pornographic material" designed to bypass these AI systems forces companies into a constant cycle of retraining their models. This is a clear example of Religion in AI, where EPCCs attempt to design AI solutions to enforce their values, but face significant ethical pitfalls.
The Datafication of Bible Reading: Shaping Scripture for the Digital Age
The Bible, the written word of God, has undergone a profound transformation, now digitized and accessible globally through apps like YouVersion Bible App. Launched in 2008 by Life.Church, YouVersion has become incredibly popular, with over 547 million installations by 2022, offering thousands of Bible versions in numerous languages, all for free.
YouVersion's success hinges on two key factors: accessibility (making the Bible available anywhere, anytime via smartphones) and frequency of use. The app employs a persuasive and "playful design," using features like reading plans, reminders, progress monitoring, and "performance badges" to encourage regular, short engagements with scripture. This "gamification" aims to make Bible reading a meaningful and transformative experience, affirming God's presence in the digital word.
This widespread engagement, however, generates a continuous stream of user data, which is then analyzed using machine intelligence tools like Google Cloud. This data helps YouVersion understand global reading habits, identify trending verses during crises (e.g., Isaiah 41:10 during the Russia-Ukraine war), and even inform decision-making about language support. AI also enhances features like the Bible Lens app, which uses "artificial vision techniques" to analyze user photos and suggest relevant Bible verses, creating shareable artistic images. This cycle of data collection and AI-driven improvement constantly "learns from the data that it collects," enhancing the user experience.
Yet, this datafication of scripture is not without its biases. The "culture embedded in the code" – the worldview of YouVersion's predominantly young, white, male developers from a megachurch background – influences how the Bible is presented and what content is prioritized. Critics argue that YouVersion tends to emphasize "broadly therapeutic texts" over more doctrinal ones. Moreover, the collective user data influences algorithmic responses, creating a "filter bubble" or "echo chamber". For instance, the source highlights a global trend where "Jeremiah 29:11" (a verse associated with prosperity) is "overtaking" "John 3:16" (a verse central to salvation) as the most shared verse, suggesting a shift towards a prosperity gospel focus within the app. This exemplifies how the "code embedded in culture" makes the interplay between platforms and users complex. The result is a more fragmented, personalized reading of the Bible that often occurs outside traditional church community contexts, emphasizing well-being and prosperity. This also falls under Religion in AI, as EPCCs develop platforms that reflect and, in turn, shape their religious practices.
Machine Agency and Spiritual Revival: The Algorithm's Role in Awakening
Spiritual revivals, periods of intense spiritual renewal, are a cherished part of EPCCs' culture. Traditionally, these movements spread through human networks and fervent prayer. However, the recent Asbury Revival in 2023 offered a powerful demonstration of how machine agency – the active role of algorithms – can accelerate such awakenings.
The Asbury Revival, which saw thousands converge on Asbury University for days of continuous worship, gained unprecedented viral traction on TikTok. Videos tagged #asburyrevival quickly garnered tens of millions of views, demonstrating the platform's power to amplify spiritual movements, especially among younger generations (Gen Z).
TikTok's design, which allows users to easily create and share short-form videos, plays a crucial role. Its "For You Page" (FYP) algorithm is a core component of its machine agency. Unlike traditional social media feeds, FYP actively curates content for users based on their interests, even if they don't follow the creator. This AI-driven curation connects "vulnerable nodes" (individuals open to spiritual influence) and creates a "percolation group," accelerating the spread of religious ideas in a "cascade effect". The algorithm's accuracy in predicting user preferences is so profound that some users perceive the tailored content as "divine intervention," as illustrated by a TikTok comment about the Asbury revival: "I was browsing TikTok, minding my own business, and an Asbury Revival clip showed up. I was beautifully wrecked by the Holy Spirit".
For EPCCs, who historically attribute revival to the Holy Spirit and human sharing, the undeniable influence of machine agency in the Asbury revival presents a new theological consideration. The algorithms themselves are becoming active participants in shaping and spreading spiritual experiences. This is a clear example of AI in Religion, where existing AI technologies are powerfully impacting religious phenomena.
Discussion and Future Considerations
The cases of sexual purity apps, Bible reading platforms, and spiritual revivals demonstrate EPCCs' proactive and multifaceted engagement with AI technology. While driven by the core values of biblicism, sanctification, and mission, this integration raises significant ethical and theological questions that need to be addressed to ensure the development of "trustworthy AI applications".
Key concerns include:
Bias and Transparency: In DPD, the unknown origin and characteristics of training data, coupled with documented biases regarding gender, race, and culture, risk perpetuating harmful stereotypes and creating flawed detection systems. There's a lack of independent studies validating the efficacy of these apps.
Surveillance and Abuse: The "digital accountability" features in purity apps can lead to intrusive surveillance and potentially abusive environments, particularly for vulnerable groups like LGBTQI+ Christians.
Altering Scripture Engagement: YouVersion's design and algorithmic curation, influenced by developers' worldviews and user data, can lead to a fragmented reading of the Bible that prioritizes therapeutic or prosperity-focused texts over deeper theological engagement, potentially reshaping doctrinal understanding within EPCCs.
Machine Agency in Spirituality: The role of algorithms in amplifying spiritual movements like the Asbury Revival necessitates a theological re-evaluation. If algorithms can be perceived as instruments of divine intervention, it blurs the lines between human, divine, and technological agency in religious experience.
The "Artificial Intelligence: An Evangelical Statement of Principles" published in 2019 by the ERLC already expressed concerns about bias and unethical data collection, emphasizing the church's role in proclaiming human dignity and advocating for the humane use of AI. Furthermore, EPCCs might benefit from considering regulations like the European Union Artificial Intelligence Act, which explicitly prohibits AI systems that deploy "subliminal techniques to distort a person's behavior" or "exploit the vulnerabilities of specific groups" to manipulate them.
In conclusion, AI is not merely a passive tool for EPCCs; it is an active participant in shaping their spiritual lives, practices, and communities. While offering unprecedented opportunities for mission and connection, the reliance on and development of AI also brings forth profound ethical dilemmas, biases, and potential for unintended theological shifts. A deeper, more critical conversation is urgently needed within EPCCs to navigate these complexities and ensure that AI serves faith in a manner that upholds human dignity and remains true to their core beliefs.
