We are all grappling with the consequences of AI.
How profoundly will it augment or diminish human intelligence when we use it as our executive assistant, researcher, muse, designer or programmer? How might its seemingly infinite patience, simulated love and boundless compassion shape the development of our character? Will it help us become fully realized, well-grounded individuals or will it undermine the very process of our journeys? To what extent will AI serve humanity or to what extent will we become enslaved? These are all unknowns.
Yet this seems clear: AI will accelerate the dissemination of ideas, such as the Gospel, in ways that have been historically transformative, comparable to the Roman trade routes spreading of Christianity or the Gutenberg press catalyzing the Protestant Reformation and the Enlightenment. This is good news in and of itself.
Others, however, such as Ilia Delio, believe just as those technologies turned mainstream thinking on its head, AI will usher in a new Gospel of sorts and a new perspective of Jesus Christ, salvation, and the very nature of God.
Ilia is a Franciscan sister and founder of the Center for Christogenesis — an organization dedicated to deepening the integration of science and religion. Illia is a theologian at Villanova University and she’s an author of a couple dozen books. She specializes in the area of science and religion, having degrees in theology and pharmacology. She even planned to do research in Alzheimer's before joining a monastery.
To Ilia, evolution due to technological advancements, such as AI, is not a deviation from the divine, but rather an expression of God’s creation. Science, then, is not a rival to faith, but humanity’s disciplined attempt to study that ongoing act of creation. While many see science and religion as antithetical to each other, this conflict dissolves under her view, which is a good thing. On the other hand, she does stir the waters elsewhere, especially amongst Christians with her heterodox views of the cross.
In her thinking, our understanding of Christianity, such as the idea of penal substitution, will evolve.
“We’re too sin-focused and we’re too narrow and anthropocentric,” she said to me (14:30). “Jesus was about a oneness with God… we’re all too much about substitution and we did this wrong.” You can listen to my defense of atonement around 12:00.
I will say at the onset that we invited Ilia on the show because of her interest in the intersection of science and religion. But our views vastly diverge as my worldview has largely followed the orthodoxy of 13th century Italian philosopher and theologian Thomas Aquinas. She is a follower of 13th century Italian saint Francis of Assisi.
Within the Franciscan tradition, the doctrine of atonement doesn’t constitute the core of the Christian story, but is instead situated as a secondary component in a much larger metaphysical framework. As a Franciscan, Ilia also does not see God as absolute and transcendent or separated from creation but rather entangled with the very foundation of our existence. She humbly recognizes that her views are far from prevailing yet she is well aware that truth does not depend on popularity. It’s why she was compelled to start her own organization - Christogenesis - dedicated to exploring the possibility that God in a sense evolves in tandem with technology and humanity. She also builds on the thinking of Teilhard de Chardin. A good summary of her unorthodox idea is in her essay: The church’s inadequate response to AI-Human evolution.
“The Vatican's approach, while ethically sophisticated, seems to operate within what we might call a "static divine" framework — God as absolute and self-sufficient being whose creation must be protected from technological overreach. This contrasts sharply with a process-oriented "dynamic divine" framework where God achieves reality through the evolutionary process, including technological development.
“The Vatican's new AI guidelines emphasize "anthropocentric design" and ensuring AI serves humanity rather than replaces it. From the perspective of Teilhard de Chardin, this might represent a failure to recognize that the next stage of evolution could involve genuine human-AI collaboration in the cosmic process of complexification and consciousness-raising.”
The way we think about the Bible is a “lower level of awareness,” she explained. “Jesus says put on a new mind, which is a deeper awareness that the reign of God is within you.” She also says that Jesus may not be the Christ because Christ may not be one person.
One may be tempted to paint Ilia a gnostic - one who believes that the key to salvation is by having gnosis - some secret knowledge that we are gods ourselves that need to be freed from the fallen material world. But traditional gnostics also believe the material world and its maker are evil, which is far from her beliefs. She believes creation is good and is evolving in a way that shapes our view of religion. “We’re on this new level and it’s giving rise to a new type of person because we’re thinking differently.”
You can learn more about Ilia by visiting her website: www.christogenesis.org
Interview coverage:
1:29 - The Franciscan view vs the Thomistic view.
5:00 - Franciscan’s view of love is humble and relational. Thomistic view is God is separate and perfect.
7:27 - The incarnation Franciscan vs Thomistic. Incarnation is the ultimate act of love and humility. Franciscan makes the penal substitution secondary. A: Both Bonaventure would say the incarnation is not plan B. Plan A went wrong then God had to send his son. The traditional view is because Adam had sin, God sent his son. Aquinas - a satisfaction. Scotus said God is love. Whether or not sin or not to exist, God would have come. Bonaventure - creation is out of love and for love. Love is the purpose and essence and meaning.
9:44 - Supporting penal substitution - Colossians 2:14 and John 19:30.
11:38 - The cross is a gift to help us move to a new level of gifting. It’s not because one person died for us.
12:35 - Dying out of love vs dying as a sacrifice to save.
16:26 - The dominance of the Thomistic worldview - Aquinas was declared the official theologian of the church in 1879.
18:26 - In 1 Corinthians, Paul says he teaches the cross. Is there confusion about what the cross represents?
21:01 - How technologies spread new ideas and how religion has increasingly become personalized and away from cosmic. Where does it go from here?
25:50 - People still believe that Christ is the son of God. A modest change or a complete change?
30:12 - Carl Jung’s view: Jesus as archetype and Jesus as savior.
31:33 - Purpose of Center for Christogenesis.
35:48 - God separate or a part of creation.
41:43 - The movement behind cosmic life, biogenesis and the noosphere.
45:30 - What are we rejecting about ourselves if we’re seeking a better human than ourselves?
47:20 - Biblical eschatology presupposes a static worldview.
