---
title: 'The Spiritual AI Future'
slug: 'spiritual-ai-future'
date: 2026-06-05
type: 'essay'
status: 'published'
tags: ['faith', 'ai', 'information-theory', 'visual-essay']
abstract: 'A short deck making the case that AI is the first technology to move internal—interwoven with the user rather than wielded as an external tool—and that this forces religious and spiritual interests to ''go internal'' too, lest spiritual formation be crowded out of the space where people will increasingly spend their days.'
license: 'CC-BY-4.0'
author: 'Jed Anderson'
co_authors: []
canonical_url: 'https://jedanderson.org/essays/spiritual-ai-future'
original_date: 2024-01-26
pdf: '/pdfs/spiritual-ai-future.pdf'
hero_image: '/images/spiritual-ai-future-hero.jpg'
hero_image_alt: 'Opening slide of The Spiritual AI Future.'
supporting_files: []
pdf_canonical: true
---

A compact early statement of the thesis later expanded in the full [Church Presentation on Spirituality and AI](/essays/church-presentation-spirituality-and-ai/). Its hunch is stated plainly: we are primarily spiritual beings, and the arrival of AI—far from threatening that—may be the catalyst that helps us learn who we more truly are.

The deck's pivot is the observation that past technologies were external tools the church could simply pick up and use; this time the tool is heading directly for our heads, interwoven with the user. That changes everything. With traditional external digital programs, spiritual interests compete with everything else for attention and stay siloed. As the very concept of the "device" fades and AI becomes the integrated lens through which the rest of digital life is viewed, religious and spiritual interests will need to "go internal" too—or be left outside the room where formation now happens.

Closing on Brother Lawrence's practice of the continual presence of God and the printing-press analogy, the deck frames the moment as a spiritual opportunity rather than a threat: handled well, the future will be incredible.

*The full deck is in the canonical PDF above.*