Can AI teach theology?
New tech is changing the way we train the next generation of Christian leaders.
Would you take a university course about ethics and artificial intelligence that was built by an algorithm? How about if the professor was an avatar and the marking was done by a machine? In 2024, six graduate students at Acadia Divinity College in Wolfville, Nova Scotia, said “yes” to these questions and embarked on a futuristic experiment.
“We are willing to innovate and to try new things for the sake of the gospel,” says Rev. John Campbell, Director of Technology for Education at Acadia Divinity College. Campbell is a member of the team of researchers who used AI to design and deliver the course. They believe it was the first university course offered in Canada and the U.S. that was completely created and delivered by AI.
Acadia, which was an early pioneer in live distance education over the internet, uses a flipped classroom model. Professors record their lectures ahead of time and students watch them before coming to class, allowing for in-class time to be more engaging and collaborative. However, this model has turned each professor into an amateur filmmaker and the time spent on creating videos was beginning to weigh on the teaching staff. This past term, the college ran a course in which a professor fed his manuscript to an AI avatar instead of recording it himself.
“Five minutes later, the video was there,” says Campbell. Student feedback has been neutral. “It did not negatively impact their learning. Didn’t really seem to positively impact it either. It made no difference, which for me is a win.”
“What’s most important, especially for a seminary, is the formation of people,” says Campbell, “So we want to free up our faculty from administrative tasks, to actually be able to spend more time with students.”
Catholic wisdom
Christian Courier asked Campbell if he found Pope Leo’s 2026 encyclical on AI, Magnifica Humanitas, useful in his research. “I read it the day that it came out,” says Campbell.
Magnifica Humanitas, released on May 25, is Pope Leo’s first major publication. Should more than just Catholic leaders be paying attention to it? Campbell thinks so. “I found it a very balanced approach in that it didn’t completely dismiss the technology as inherently evil or bad or [that it] should be avoided, but it also doesn’t embrace it as fully good and the answer to every problem.”
Across the country at Mennonite Brethren Biblical Seminary in Langley, B.C., president and associate professor of Biblical Studies for Leadership Mark Wessner says he appreciated the Pope’s words too. Despite it being a long read at over 40,000 words, Magnifica Humanitas may be more accessible than it first appears. Wessner read it on his phone the day it was released.
“The way he introduced it and wrote it, you could be from almost any faith tradition or no faith tradition and think, ‘he’s actually writing to someone like me.’”
In a section of the encyclical on the importance of human flourishing, Pope Leo says: “Technological innovations, including artificial intelligence, are not neutral, for they can either foster participation and justice or exacerbate inequality, control and exclusion.”
Wessner says he found that section fascinating. “That’s often the common thought: that technology is inherently neutral. But [the Pope] pushed back on that in a thoughtful way.”
Research vs. production
As a well-known leadership coach, in addition to his academic role, Wessner also sees AI through the lens of personal formation: “We’re starting to use the framework of differentiation between research and production.” To students, the school says to use AI for research if needed, but to rely on their own thinking for production. To faculty, they say the reverse: don’t use AI for research, but for production. Wessner also wisely adds, “Where it gets in trouble is if someone does both.”
“There are significant dangers when a leader outsources their ability to think critically to something else. Whether that’s a consultant or an AI, it doesn’t matter. That’s a dangerous path to go down because you slowly distance yourself from whatever you’re involved with, and you lose the connection and the capacity to lead it well,” says Wessner.
Campbell agrees that technology needs to be steered towards the good. “It really comes down to our understanding of who we are and who we want to be. It’s about being aware of how this technology can shape us and how we can shape it, for good or evil.”
He also relates it back to underlying ideas about education: “It doesn’t really have anything to do with AI. It has everything to do with, what does it mean to form people? Is an essay really the best way to determine whether someone understands the material? These debates were happening long before AI. AI has simply forced institutions to actually address them.”
Faithful leadership
So what does faithful leadership look like now, when AI is raising some of the most fundamental questions about our institutions?
As someone deeply invested in the spiritual formation of Christian leaders, Wessner believes that “faithful leadership always has to be anchored in what is known, what is real, and what is true. It must use wisdom to continue helping humanity flourish and to integrate [technology] in a way that moves us toward the fully restored human order that God has in mind. Neither totally rejecting new things out of hand nor blindly accepting everything without thinking critically.”
In Nova Scotia, working in front of 150 years of institutional innovation, John Campbell offers this encouragement: “Step one is to be crystal clear as to what your mission as an organization is. It’s got to be rooted in that. What are you called to do? We need to create space where it’s okay to spend quality time exploring possibilities that may not lead to measurable outcomes. For leaders, for presidents, senior pastors, my best advice would be to carve out space and articulate to the people you lead: I want you to try something new that’s not for any purpose other than learning and seeing what’s possible.”
Pope Leo would seem to concur. He closes Magnifica Humanitas with this call: “We must be faithful to the truth, invest in education, cultivate relationships and love justice and peace. Let us remain faithful to the truth!”
Ever since I served on Calvin Theological Seminary board, I’ve had a lingering twinge of suspicion that a very important goal called “spiritual formation.” I here noticed the phrase “form people”; same twinge. I think ‘nudge,’ ‘inspire,’ ‘co-respond’, ‘mentor,’ ‘encourage’ are more along the lines that education in a seminary might pursue. (Maybe ‘co-respond’ is the most neglected: the teacher is shaped through interractions with students).