AI and the Church
The Office of Innovation, in collaboration with partners from various denominations, is committed to helping churches navigate the transformative landscape of Generative Artificial Intelligence. Our work prioritizes Christian ethics, along with critical issues of justice, access, and equity in the use of AI tools. To advance these goals, we are convening a diverse group of practitioners, theologians, and innovators across denominations to explore fundamental questions about AI and to build a long-term learning community over the next three years.
The 2026 AI & Church Summit
"The Agency of the People of God in the Age of AI"
August 24-27th, 2026
Register at AIChurchSummit.org.
This year's Summit brings together four denominations to collaborate and work towards a faithful response that celebrates the image of God in all humans in a rapidly automating world.
The event features four keynote speakers, each addressing a key task of practical theology:
- Mackenzie Roberts (Muscogee Creek Nation): A community leader addressing the on-the-ground impact of the AI economy, such as data centers and infrastructure development.
- Chloe Lubinski (Anthropic): Leads Research Partnerships with wisdom traditions and will provide insights into the rapid development and ecosystem of frontier AI systems.
- Dr. Brian Patrick Green (Santa Clara University): An expert in technology ethics will discuss human agency in the age of AI, engaging with the encyclical Magnifica Humanitas.
- The Right Reverend Mariann Edgar Budde (Bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Washington): A leader in social justice and community engagement, will close the summit by focusing on the Church's response and voice.
To join the virtual experience, register at AIChurchSummit.org.
We invite you to view the 2024 and 2025 AI & the Church Summit Journals. These journals provide transcripts, keynote addresses, and theological reflections from faith leaders, scholars, and theologians across the country. To view the 2024-Seattle Journal, scroll down the page as it is located directly under the 2025-Minneapolis Journal.
To view additional AI-related tools, guides, and suggested reading, visit our resources page.
1. AI as a Site of Power, Geopolitics, and Global Inequality
AI development is inseparable from geopolitical competition, resource extraction, and nation‑building dynamics. Current trajectories—particularly within U.S. policy—risk reinforcing global inequities, consolidating power, and reproducing colonial patterns, especially in Africa and other resource‑rich regions. AI is not neutral infrastructure; it is an extension of political and economic interests.
2. Policy Choices Around AI Have Disproportionate Social Consequences
Federal approaches to AI governance were critiqued for weakening ethical guardrails while actively targeting diversity, equity, and inclusion as liabilities. These policy shifts have tangible impacts, including disproportionate job losses among Black women and expanded use of AI in surveillance and immigration enforcement, signaling how AI can deepen racialized and gendered harm when ethics are sidelined.
3. AI Is Reshaping Human Formation, Not Just Tools or Workflows
AI systems function as formative technologies, shaping how people learn, reason, and understand citizenship and belonging—particularly in education. Parallels to historical nation‑building reveal that AI training practices influence whose knowledge counts, how norms are transmitted, and what kinds of persons societies are cultivating.
4. Rejecting Homogenized Humanity in the Face of Transhumanism
Discussions of transhumanism underscored the danger of flattening human identity into universal, technologically optimized models. The summit advanced a counter‑vision that affirms culturally situated understandings of dignity and personhood, resisting physicalist and futurist narratives that reduce humanity to data, efficiency, or enhancement.
5. Toward Ethical AI Grounded in Cultural Wisdom and Intersectionality
A constructive path forward emerged through proposals for constellational ethics—an approach emphasizing intersectional analysis, cultural humility, and historically grounded wisdom. Practical examples, such as AI platforms trained on Black literary traditions for therapeutic use, demonstrated how AI can be designed to honor lived experience, plural personhood, and communal healing rather than extraction or control.