Issue: December 2025/January 2026: Artificial Intelligence, Spirituality, and the Church

[1] There is a lot of talk about artificial intelligence. As there is a rush to market the uses of AI, there is a need to create guardrails and guidelines for the use of AI in order to protect intellectual property, safeguard personal data, and reign in the energy consumption of AI.  Here at Journal […]

[1] The topic of artificial intelligence has moved from science fiction to science and business. The essays in this issue raise topics for discussion that relate to spirituality and the church.  The following is a brief discussion guide to help congregations think through the issues presented in this edition of JLE. [2] The essay by […]

[1] We are living through a technological watershed driven by artificial intelligence. Since the arrival of early generative Large Language Models (LLMs) in 2017, billions of dollars, years of research, and instruments of state power have all been used to reshape our world to better accommodate the next generation of AI models.[1] These technologies are […]

[1] Earlier this year, I was asked to serve as a co-investigator on a research project aimed at demonstrating the effectiveness of spiritual care in helping emergency trauma nurses cope with experiences of moral injury in their work experiences. As I am currently serving as a chaplain, I eagerly accepted the invitation to participate. However, […]

[1] “If we open up ChatGPT or a system like it and look inside, you just see millions of numbers flipping around a few hundred times a second, and we just have no idea what any of it means….We built the computers, but then we just gave the faintest outline of a blueprint and kind […]

[1] To describe the concerns raised by artificial intelligence (AI) would require us to speak of a broad swath of concerns: the environment, energy supply, human rights, privacy, employment, the future of the arts, and scholarship. While those who aim to profit financially from AI focus on its potential, which does indeed seem remarkable, other […]

We need to ensure and safeguard a space for proper human control over the choices made by artificial intelligence programs: human dignity itself depends on it. Pope Francis1 BACKGROUND [1] Artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning have been around for a long time, but in the past five years they have become nearly ubiquitous, thanks […]

[1] Esteemed readers of the Journal of Lutheran Ethics, in this volume we shall explore a recent morally significant theological examination of the Lutheran approach to child abuse. Child abuse is a pressing social problem with severe long-lasting effects that has commonly been recognized as a major public health crisis in our society. The Journal […]

[1] In November of 2025, the ELCA approved a social message on child protection which calls for a number of reforms and greater theological engagement with the topic of child abuse. One of the resources cited in the social message is Here We Stand: A Lutheran Response to Child Abuse. This book is a collection […]