This post is part one of a five-part series reflecting on each session of a conference hosted by Notre Dame University. It was led by Christopher Watkin (Associate Professor of French Studies at Monash University, Melbourne). The goal of the conference, and goal of these reflections, was to engage thoughtfully with AI from a Christian perspective, consistent with our vision at Barker as a Christian leader in education.

Much of the conversation surrounding artificial intelligence begins with the technology itself: what it can do, how fast it is developing, and whether it will help or harm humanity. Watkin suggests a different starting point. Rather than beginning with AI, Christians should begin with deeper questions about the human person.

Who are we? Who is God? What are we for? What story are we living in? And what does a genuinely good human life look like?

These questions lead to three important inquiries: What can AI do? What is AI doing to us? And what does AI reveal about us? Of these, the I feel that third may be the most significant. AI is forcing society to wrestle with questions that Christianity has been engaging for centuries.

Many of the most influential voices in AI do not merely present technology as a useful tool. They present it as a vision of salvation. Thinkers such as Ray Kurzweil imagine a future where ageing is overcome, intelligence is expanded, and human beings become deeply integrated with technology (Kurzweil, 2024). We are promised longer lives, enhanced capabilities, and even freedom from many of the limitations that define our existence.

This raises an important observation: engaging with AI is increasingly an exercise in comparative religion.

A gospel tells a story. It explains what the world should be like, what has gone wrong, and how salvation can be achieved. Increasingly, the AI movement presents its own version of this narrative.

In the “AI gospel,” the ideal world is one in which intelligence and information flow freely and friction is removed. What is wrong with the world is not primarily sin, broken relationships, or alienation from God. Instead, the problem is our biological limitations: ageing, disease, limited intelligence, imperfect memories, and physical constraints.

The solution? More intelligence. As DeepMind founder Demis Hassabis has suggested, if we solve intelligence, we can solve everything else (Hassabis, 2026). AI becomes the means of redemption, liberating humanity from its limitations and enabling us to become whatever we choose to be.

But this vision carries assumptions. It assumes that humanity's fundamental problem is a lack of capability, and that salvation comes through technological progress. As Marshall McLuhan famously observed, we should not only ask what technology does but also what it undoes. Every gain comes with a loss. AI may increase efficiency, but it can also weaken the human capacities it replaces. If AI writes all my emails, I gain time but may lose the ability to communicate thoughtfully myself.

The biblical story offers a very different framework.

Creation tells us that the world is good. Human creativity and technological innovation are good gifts. Yet Scripture also teaches that limits are not defects. Adam and Eve were finite creatures before the Fall, and God declared creation "very good." Our problem is not that we are limited; it is that we are fallen.

Walter Brueggemann's pattern of orientation, disorientation, and new orientation helps illuminate the biblical story (Brueggemann, 1980). Unlike the AI narrative of continual upward progress, the Christian story insists that genuine renewal passes through disorientation. Abraham must leave his homeland. Israel passes through exile. Jesus goes to the cross before the resurrection.

Sin is not merely inefficiency or lack of intelligence. It is a rupture in relationship with God. Human beings repeatedly attempt to save themselves through technique, control, and self-sufficiency. Scripture exposes this impulse and calls us instead to grace.

The Christian gospel therefore offers something radically different from the AI gospel. AI promises salvation without sin, transcendence without the cross, and immortality without judgment. Christianity offers forgiveness for sinners, redemption through suffering, and reconciliation with God through Jesus Christ.

Perhaps the deepest irony is one noted by C. S. Lewis in The Abolition of Man (Lewis, 1943). If humanity itself is the source of the problem, how can humanity ultimately define the solution? The AI vision asks us to trust ourselves more completely. The Christian gospel invites us to receive what we cannot achieve on our own.

In an AI age, that may be the most important distinction of all.

Two Recommended Texts for further exploration:

Martin Heidiger – The Question Concerning Technology

John Dyer - From the Garden to the City

References

Brueggemann, W. (1980). Psalms and the life of faith: A suggested typology of function. Journal for the Study of the Old Testament, 5(17), 3–32.

Kurzweil, R. (2024, June 27). The last 6 decades of AI and what comes next [Video]. TED. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uEztHu4NHrs

Lewis, C. S. (1943). The abolition of man. HarperCollins.

Shontell, A. (Interviewer), & Hassabis, D. (Interviewee). (2026, February 11). Can Google's new AI solve everything? | Titans and Disruptors [Video]. Fortune Magazine. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BhfTQXMtoZw

Rev. Craig Tubman

Craig Tubman serves as the Community Chaplain at Barker College. He has been in School’s Ministry for 17 years, serving previously as Senior Chaplain at St Andrews Cathedral School and The Cranbrook School. He is the Chair of the Sydney Anglican Schools Ministry Association (SASMA) and on the Sydney Anglican Diocesan Policy Statement on Education Review Committee. He is currently completing a Theological Research Masters on the topic of the role of the Chaplain in a Sydney Anglican School.