Source: The Wall Street Journal (paywall)
Religious institutions are intervening in AI policy and ethics earlier than they did with social media or biotech, responding directly to rhetoric from OpenAI and other labs about machine consciousness and the potential creation of new forms of intelligence. This is a strategic shift: they're moving from reactive responses to proactive positioning. It also reflects how Christian leaders view AI's existential and metaphysical implications as distinct from previous digital disruptions. The speed of engagement matters. AI companies' millennial-tinged spiritual framing—consciousness, sentience, creation—collides with institutional religion's traditional domain, forcing a faster negotiation over whose authority interprets meaning-making technologies.