Can AI do this?

There has been an influx of AI fear flooding my timeline this past week. Many people are talking about the capabilities of AI and that there are major disruptions happening in the labor market even now. There is a strong belief that we are underestimating what AI can do and will do.

I really believe that religion, and Christianity in particular, will thrive in spite of this huge technological shift. In fact, in the face of the turbulence, Christianity seems to be surging this year especially among the younger generations.

Religion connects us not only to God but also gets to the root of what it means to be human and to have a human experience. AI will never be human, and so it can only give an artificial answer to our deepest and most fundamental questions.

One of the human longings we have that seems absent AI is beauty. AI is concerned with form, function, and efficiency. Beauty and taste are human, outside the grasp of a computer mind.

Christianity is particularly concerned with beauty. After all, it is God who created all things. Something about his character desires beauty and he has chose to imbue the cosmos with beauty. God seemed not solely concerned with efficiency or function, though creation certainly has those characteristics as well. We are created in God’s image, and there is a craving in us to find and enjoy beautiful things, though we may not understand why the longing exists other than pleasure.

Churches ought to lean into beauty, leaving the large box buildings and returning to a time where we choose to make our spaces ornate.

I have a pastor friend who has leaned into this concept of beauty, sensing that making his church space beautiful says something profound about God, about the congregation, about the surrounding community. It also sets his church apart, that they are a church that celebrates beauty. They have planted a butterfly and wildflower meadow as well as installed a natural playground.

But he is not arguing that beauty stops at a physical space. No, our space simply inspires us to also be. We should actively aim to make our lives beautiful as we reflect God in our being and doing.

This type of beauty that encompasses the physical and spiritual realm of human reality is outside the scope of AI, and something that will forever persist in the human experience.

Pursue beauty.

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