Methodist church uses ChatGPT for Texas service. ‘A human element is still needed’

Artificial intelligence was used for a Texas Methodist church’s Sunday service, but its pastor insists it was just a one-time thing.Violet Crown City Church in Austin entered “somewhat uncharted territory” with its Sunday, Sept. 17, service by allowing ChatGPT to create its worship, prayers and sermon.

ChatGPT, which stands for Chat Generative Pre-trained Transformer, is a chatbot that creates human-like dialogue based off a prompt given by the user.

The purpose of the service, pastor Jay Cooper said in a Facebook post, was for parishioners “to consider the nature of truth and challenge our assumptions about what God can make sacred and inspired.”

“We believe it’s a worthy and timely one in our ever-changing world, especially with the rise of AI,” Cooper said.

But there were kinks that needed to be ironed out before Sunday.

Cooper told KXAN that ChatGPT created a 15-minute service, and it was “very clear that a human element is still needed.” He said he used additional prompts to beef up the sermon.

While Cooper does not have plans to use AI again, he said the model can be a tool used by churches, according to MySanAntonio.com.

“To update an old saying, Christians need to approach life and a life of faith with the Bible in one hand and a smartphone in the other,” he told the publication.

Ernest Chambers, who attended the AI service, said the sermon lacked feelings, according to KXAN. He said ChatGPT is unable to convey the love, kindness and empathy of a typical service.

Violet Crown City Church is not the first church to use artificial intelligence for its service. In June, St. Paul’s Church in Fuerth, Germany, used ChatGPT to create a 40-minute sermon for its 300 parishioners, according to The Associated Press.

The service had mixed reviews, with one worshiper telling the AP it lacked heart and soul. Another person noted their surprise of how well it worked, though he said it was “a bit bumpy at times.”