Is AI an assist, an adjunct, or an adversary in Healthcare Chaplaincy? AI and Faith held a Chaplaincy Forum in July.
We had 175 people join us for a day of discussion on the intersection of artificial intelligence, chaplaincy, and healthcare. Through a presentation and moderated discussion, experts from across the field, including certified chaplain David Fleenor, Professor of Ethics Tracy Trothen, and Professor of Computer Science C. Estelle Smith, assessed the challenges and opportunities artificial intelligence offers in this field, exploring if artificial intelligence is good for chaplaincy and how it will affect people. Rabbi Dr. Jason Weiner of the Cedars-Sinai Medical Center moderated the discussion.
AI and Faith Research Director Mark Graves opened the symposium with a grounding in how generative AI works and discussed Magnifica Humanitas, the new papal encyclical whose theology of finitude speaks directly to a profession that accompanies people at their limits. Fleenor then mapped the field along a single continuum, from AI that helps a chaplain do the work to AI that does the work in a chaplain’s place, showing that AI has already arrived at every point along that line and characterizing an empathy paradox: people often rate AI responses as more empathic than human ones, yet still choose the person. In conversation with Weiner, Trothen and Smith took up what this means in practice: grief bots, assistive technologies for aging adults, and online spiritual care communities; a forthcoming expert consensus study that accepts AI for administrative tasks but divides sharply over patient-facing care; the need to build AI literacy into chaplain formation; whether chatbots expand access to care or excuse cutting it; and whether an AI-generated prayer can carry real meaning. The day closed not with a verdict but with a call to remain reflective and intentional — and with Fleenor’s deeper question: not what is AI for, but what is chaplaincy for?
Chaplaincy Symposium Part 1: Introductions and AI Foundations for Chaplains – Dr. Mark Graves
Chaplaincy Symposium Part 2: Reading from the Same Chart – Rev. Dr. David Fleenor
Chaplaincy Symposium Part 3: Main Panel – Dr. C. Estelle Smith and Dr. Tracy Trothen, with moderator Rabbi Dr. Jason Weiner
Views and opinions expressed by authors and editors are their own and do not necessarily reflect the view of AI and Faith or any of its leadership.
