Chatbots as the New Career Counselor: How AI Will Reshape Vocation, and How the Church Should Respond

Did you ever take a career aptitude test?

Although I can't recall ever taking one myself, aptitude tests are frequently shown in popular media. In cartoons, these tests effectively match characters with their perfect professions. In movies, they often directed the main character towards their ideal career. A particular example that comes to mind is the (now controversial) film The Blind Side. Following an aptitude test, the character of Michael Oher excels in areas related to "protective instincts," which sets him on the path to becoming an NFL left tackle.

Regardless of the accuracy of these evaluations, they rely on the belief that a career assessment can collect personal information and produce the perfect job match. This basic assumption (despite its imperfections) will soon extend beyond the Guidance Office and into other technologies like GenAI and chatbots. We are on the brink of witnessing a surge in algorithmic career counseling, on platforms including LinkedIn, Indeed, and ChatGPT. AI will offer direct career advice with minimal user input, becoming the go-to career coach of the digital age.

Algorithmic career counseling will take several forms. Want to know what jobs to apply to? No need to attend a job fair or to actively build your professional network. Enter your education experience, skills, and interests into ChatGPT. Want to know where you would rank among the top 1% of applicants? No need to research a company. Just upgrade to LinkedIn Premium and upload your resume. Want to know if you are earning less than you are worth? Don't waste your time suspiciously grumbling around the water cooler. Describe your job responsibilities on a chatbot and ask it to analyze market compensation trends. People will turn to AI to try to find work that is more engaging, lucrative, and even impactful.

One of the key advantages of AI-powered job boards is their ability to continuously scan the vast landscape of available positions, presenting users with a curated selection of opportunities that align with their career aspirations. Through complex algorithms, AI can match candidates with roles that not only match their qualifications but also offer the potential for growth and advancement, making the job search process more efficient and targeted.

The integration of AI technology in career guidance will profoundly influence our perception of our professions. The integration of AI in these job boards goes beyond simple job listings; it delves into the realm of resume analysis and generation, providing users with personalized insights and recommendations tailored to their skills and experiences.

I am particularly worried about the implications of AI on individuals' careers and sense of meaning. By presenting users with an idealized version of their professional lives, AI has the power to amplify a worker's feelings of dissatisfaction with their present situation. In providing users with a vast set of ever-present alternatives, AI will taunt us with the promise that "true purpose" can be found on the other side of a job search. This is likely to increase dissatisfaction and unease at work, hindering career advancement and leading to increased turnover rates. Ultimately, we might all experience a lasting sense of uneasiness and dissatisfaction with our chosen careers.

My hope, however naive it may be, is that this unease and anxiety will prompt a return to more intentional and traditional methods of career guidance and vocational exploration, which can be effectively facilitated by clergy, lay ministers, and church leaders.

Dissatisfaction and the return of discernment

This dissatisfaction will lead to accelerating rates of turnover.

Employees will switch between employers, positions, and fields more frequently and rapidly. As one disappointing opportunity follows another, workers will swiftly seek out new changes. The length of time an employee stays with a company will decrease. Loyalty from employers towards employees (if there is any remaining) will further diminish. Even traditionally stable, full-time positions will begin to resemble freelance work. In this culture of continual job change, it becomes increasingly probable that we’ll find ourselves spending more time in roles that are distant from our core values and natural talents.

Speed and turnover are the antithesis of vocational formation. Guided by AI career advice, the active pursuit of vocational fulfillment will only breed vocational emptiness. That's because the factors that algorithms use to match users to jobs (an employee's skillset, and employer's compensation package) don't correlate with an inner sense of satisfcation, fulfillment, or meaning. They stand in contrast to a faith-driven process of vocational discernment, where we work with a trusted mentor or leader to discover our core values, recognize our innate aptitudes, and to identify where these individual gifts can be of service to the neighbor. In such a faith-driven process, we recognize the possibility that God may in fact have a calling in store for all of us.

Vocational formation is a lengthy process of working out our calling. A calling is not where our skills align with the needs of a business who is willing to compensate us for our time and efforts. Such a view is an impediment towards finding a meaningful vocation. To quote Frederick Buechner, a calling is "where your deep gladness and the world's deep hunger meet." No matter how quickly AI advances, it's improbable that it will ever be able to contemplate such concepts of "deep gladness" and "deep hunger." While AI may excel at processing vast amounts of data and performing complex tasks, the ability to contemplate and engage with the nuanced complexities of human emotions and desires remains a distinctly human trait.

Today's faith leader (or even a faithful person in a secular mentorship role) should take on opportunities to accompany individuals throughout the discernment process. This might involve shared inquiry into core values, mapping those core values to gifts and abilities, and identifying specific experiences where those gifts and abilities meet the needs of the neighbor. It will most certainly be more expansive than a "jobs" conversation. Vocation is a much broader concept than any nine-to-five, extending to familial, social, and cultural structures. A Christian vocational advisor is not merely focused on one's work life but is someone who can take a comprehensive and holistic approach to our life journey. By intertwining faith, values, talents, and community needs, these advisors help individuals uncover a sense of purpose that extends beyond personal fulfillment to making a positive impact on the world around them.

For all of the talk in the church about "decline" and "secularism," there is something to be gained when we take up the work of faithful vocational counseling. There is growth to be realized in identifying the connection points between a person's innate gifts and the world's great needs, with clarifying that God calls all of us to serve. The role of a faith leader or a faithful mentor is to illuminate the path towards a vocation that is not just about what we do for a living but about who we are called to be in all aspects of our experience. It is a journey of self-discovery, alignment with core values, and a commitment to serving others in a way that reflects the essence of who God created us to be. This process of contemplation and action not only benefits the individual but also contributes to the collective wellbeing of the community, creating a positive ripple effect that extends far beyond the walls of the church. This is a process that no chatbot can ever displace.

Theological Education & Artificial Intelligence: How Seminaries Should Teach with ChatGPT

A new academic year has started. Students are scrolling syllabi and buying e-Books, while faculty and instructors dust-off PowerPoints and lecture notes. At the same time, academic institutions are grappling with a new technology: generative artificial intelligence. Suddenly, students can generate thorough summaries of assigned reading in a fraction of the time it takes to read the complete work. Moreover, students can generate complete (albeit substandard) essays and term papers from a chatbot. So much for the academic rigor of a curriculum emphasizing independent reading - and written work!

Much has been written about how colleges and graduate schools are adapting their curricula in response to this new technology. Group presentations, project work, and in-person written exams are replacing the take-home essay. Institutions of theological education need to make these same adjustments. Seminaries, however, are unique among graduate schools in that their response to AI needs to transcend the logistics of assigned work.

It is essential for seminary educators to collaborate with their students in exploring the ethical and developmental aspects of artificial intelligence. Unfortunately, cultural observers have mostly disregarded these factors, concentrating more on the contentious aspects of AI, such as its potential for abuse or the risk of job displacement.

AI is a major technology, and major technologies have moral and formative dimensions that we must work to understand. As Marshall McLuhan said, "We become what we behold. We shape our tools, and thereafter our tools shape us." Just how much will AI shape us? Well, if we are to believe Professor Andrew Ng of Stanford, one of the world's most influential experts on AI, AI will be the "new electricity." As with electricity, AI will change not just what we are capable of doing - but how we see the world around us.

Much of the broader higher education dialogue on AI has focused on the practicalities of its use in the classroom: will students plagiarize ChatGPT? Will chatbots displace the role of teaching assistants? These questions are important - but they are not the only considerations that we must take up. Those called to theological education are called to explore how AI shapes and forms today's culture - and by extension, how it forms today's church.

The questions posed by artificial intelligence vary by academic discipline. In Biblical studies, the questions involve hermeneutics. In my own testing, I have observed how chatbots can prooftext and substantiate seemingly any theological perspective. I can ask ChatGPT to identify Bible passages to support a contentious political belief. I can ask AI to use the Bible to substantiate my denomination's statement of faith. With AI, I can press the Bible into serving my worldview. What does it mean for Biblical interpretation when the scripture becomes a resource to be mined in support of a specific worldview? And how might church leaders respond by teaching a better way to read the scriptures?

In homiletics, the questions involve sermon development and sermon reception. Chatbots create quick, succinct summaries. How will that change the ability to listen to a sermon in its entirety? AI can summarize any long-form content - from a podcast to Karl Barth's Church Dogmatics. This technology is already capable of creating succinct summaries of text and video content (ie, a sermon recording). What happens to sermons when our society develops a preference for pithy summaries instead of original content? How does a preacher remain faithful to the text and to God in a context with a much shorter span of attention?

In systematic theology, the questions involve our core doctrines. I wonder specifically about AI's propensity to airbrush any imperfection - in our grammar, in our music, in our decision-making processes. How do we re-imagine the doctrine of creation when creatio ex nihilo (creation out of nothing) becomes the domain of generative chatbots? How do we re-imagine the doctrine of salvation in a world where our work can be polished and perfected with the assistance of AI?

In pastoral care, the questions involve trust and authority. A crisis of authenticity emerges as AI-generated content becomes ubiquitous. What becomes of trust and relationship in an online environment where AI-generated creations, deep fakes included, masquerade as the creations of human beings? And what happens to the pastor-parishioner bond when our culture poses the big questions first to ChatGPT - rather than the pastor?

That's not to say that artificial intelligence only contests faith formation and Christian community. Seminaries should also examine where AI promotes the flourishing of faith. Theological educators ought to experiment with where AI can be channeled towards spiritually nourishing ends, using AI generated content for conversation, discernment, and spiritual formation.

As I explored with Dr. Michael Chan in a post for Church Anew, GenAI is a powerful tool in giving coherence to our experiences. We can use AI to create a cohesive narrative of our faith experiences, one that edifies our own spirituality while connecting us more deeply across our faith communities. The theological educator might consider what it takes to faithfully articulate one's faith story with the assistance of a tool like ChatGPT. Christian communities can be formed to use AI to promote curiosity. The content it generates provides a sort of source material for deeply human conversations taking place in analog communities.

As students and educators embark on this new academic year, I am optimistic that seminaries and theological educators will take the lead in exploring these ethical and formative questions. By doing so, they can motivate a fresh cohort of church leaders who are not only knowledgeable in theology but also dedicated to advancing the church's mission in a world on the cusp of significant technological advancement.

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@ryanpanzer graduated from Luther Seminary before it was possible to copy from ChatGPT.

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How to Write a Church Newsletter with AI and ChatGPT

If pressed to identify which weekly message is the most important and formative, some church leaders would identify their sermons. I suspect that many more would cite their email newsletter.

Each week, only one of three American adults attends church. For better or worse, the vast majority of us will connect to our faith communities through digital communications rather than Word & Sacrament. Setting aside the obvious theological issues, it is increasingly clear that a ministry's digital communications aren't just any ordinary calendar. Newsletters are how countless parishioners connect with the mission of the church - and with one another. That quick glance at a pastor's letter, that quick scan of a sermon summary, that cursory glance at events for the upcoming week - might be the only moment of faith community some of us experience week in and week out.

AI tools like ChatGPT can help us to be more effective communicators. They can improve our newsletter content in both style and substance, exporting our proclamation to a dispersed faith community.

Use AI to open the newsletter with theological reflection from a recognized leader

The opening section of your newsletter is your opportunity to articulate where God is showing up in your context. It should precede the logistics: specifics on Bible study start times, quilting group meeting dates, VBS registration processes.

Think of that first block of text as a sermon in miniature, a chance to collate readings, liturgies, and seasons with the particulars of your ministry context. And this is where AI can be so useful. ChatGPT and other applications can help you to consolidate, contextualize, and organize your ideas.

To write a theological reflection using AI, write a prompt that instructs the bot to create a succinct summary of your most recent sermon. Explain that it will be used to open your weekly email newsletter. You may even prompt AI to connect that summary with local, national, or global events.

Recently, I preached a sermon on Mark 5:21-43 (the healing of Jairus' daughter). If I were to repurpose my sermon for an email communication, I would prompt AI to do the following:

Repurpose the following sermon on Mark 5:21-43 for use in an email newsletter. The summary should be no longer than 250 words. Connect the sermon to the back to school season, including a reference to families returning to fall routines.

Here's what ChatGPT recommended based on my input:

As families gear up for the back-to-school season and adjust to fall routines, it's a perfect moment to reflect on everyday heroes and the lessons they teach us. In Mark 5:21-43, we encounter Jairus, a synagogue leader whose life is turned upside down when his young daughter falls gravely ill. Despite his privileged position, Jairus faces profound fear and desperation. He approaches Jesus with a plea for help, showing remarkable faith even in the midst of uncertainty. However, his journey is far from straightforward. Jesus’ response is delayed as He attends to other needs, including healing a woman with a hemorrhage. Jairus is left waiting, grappling with his fear and frustration.

This story highlights a powerful lesson for us as we transition into the school year. Like Jairus, many of us face periods of waiting and uncertainty, whether it’s navigating new academic challenges, adjusting to family schedules, or dealing with personal struggles. Jairus’ experience reminds us that faith involves trusting in God’s timing and being patient through the process.

As we dive into the fall season, let’s find inspiration in Jairus’ quiet strength and unwavering hope. His story encourages us to embrace our roles as unsung heroes in our own lives, managing the highs and lows with faith and perseverance. Just as Jairus waited for Jesus to show up, we are invited to wait expectantly for God’s presence and guidance in our daily routines and challenges. May this season be a time of reflection, renewal, and recognizing the extraordinary in the ordinary.

Not a bad start to an email communication for late August!

Use AI to summarize your events

One of the best ways to use AI for your newsletter is to format and organize your calendar.

After your theological summary, it's time to organize the dates, times, and locations of events in your community. AI accelerates the process by organizing unformatted, disorganized inputs into a coherent message.

Use AI to generate images

If you're going to take the time to send a weekly newsletter, you need to take the time to include an image. Newsletters with an image have a five percent higher click through rate than emails without an image. But congregations without a media team or graphic designer may not have a source of consistent images and illustrations.

Thats' where AI can help.

From promotional images built with Canva, to sermon illustrations built with ChatGPT 4, AI accelerates the image generation process to boost the visibility of your communications.

Image generation often requires a paid subscription to an AI application. I've found ChatGPT's paid models create the most engaging images (including posters to promote an upcoming event), though Canva's free image generators are't a bad substitute. Canva helped me create this picture of Martin Luther using an iPhone:

When prompting AI to generate an image for a newsletter, be specific about the theme and the intent of the newsletter. Provide clear guidelines on the desired style, color scheme, and content of the image to ensure it aligns with the overall message you want to convey. The image should complement the written content and enhance the overall impact of the newsletter.

Be prepared to provide feedback and iterate on the generated images as needed. By engaging in a collaborative process with the AI, you can ensure that the final image meets your expectations and effectively serves its purpose within the newsletter.