1 in 4 pastors now use AI to write sermons, Barna survey finds

A growing number of American pastors are turning to artificial intelligence to help write sermons, a trend that has drawn theological pushback from the Vatican and divided congregations.

Roughly a quarter of US pastors now use AI to help write their sermons, up from 12 percent in 2024, according to the Barna Group, a faith-research firm. Half of all pastors say they use AI for brainstorming or idea generation. The rapid adoption has sparked debate over where the line between human ministry and machine assistance should fall — a question Pope Leo XIV addressed earlier this year when he warned clergy that artificial intelligence cannot give a true homily.

"Preaching is truth through personality," said Darrell Stetler II, lead pastor at Bible Methodist Church in Oklahoma City and a member of ChatGPT's top 1 percent of users. Stetler, who runs a Facebook group of 500 pastors experimenting with AI, said the time saved by chatbots goes toward hospital visits and congregation care. A sermon that once took him 10 to 15 hours to prepare now takes several hours less, he said.

Stetler earns $600 a week plus a $1,500 monthly housing stipend — less than his housing costs — and takes construction jobs on the side. His church keeps about two months of reserves. The financial pressure makes AI's efficiency gains hard to ignore, even for pastors who remain wary. "This AI does not enjoy what it finds," Stetler said. "It cannot love it."

The technology's reach extends well beyond sermon drafting. In California, the Rev. Justin Lester built PastorGPT, a free small-language model trained on a pastor's own sermons that refreshes itself weekly by downloading and transcribing new uploads from YouTube. More than 30 churches now run versions of it. Lester also brought a robot dog named Theo — trained on his sermons — to trot the aisles of his church on Sundays.

On Long Island, the Rev. Dwight Lee Wolter of the Congregational Church of Patchogue turned to ChatGPT after the 2024 assassination attempt on Donald Trump, asking the chatbot what he should tell his congregation the next morning. It produced what he called a nearly perfect prayer. Wolter, 75, said he also used AI to write hymns with AI-generated music. "I cannot imagine that a time is not coming that AI will present us with a God that's more attractive and more flexible and 24/7," he said.

The theological pushback is sharp. Meghan Sullivan, a philosophy professor at the University of Notre Dame leading a research project on AI and religion, said using AI to draft anything spoken in worship reflects a basic misunderstanding of what Christians believe happens when a preacher delivers a homily. Churches, she said, may be among the last institutions where people sit still and encounter another human being without mediation. "Martin Luther is rolling over in his grave," Sullivan said, at the idea of handing scripture off to what she called a theological software middleman.

Stetler himself has made mistakes. Two years ago, rushing to finish a sermon slide on a South Pacific missionary, he dropped in an AI-generated image without checking it closely. After the service, a congregant pointed out a topless woman in the background. He apologized on the spot and now tells the story as a cautionary tale.

During a recent Sunday sermon, Stetler worked through an AI-generated "Seven Domains" handout that fell out of sync with his slides. "AI has failed me," he told worshipers. "It's really messed me up."

Reactions among his congregation are mixed. Chad Christiansen, 48, said he uses AI for his youth nonprofit and is taking an agentic-AI course alongside Stetler. Elizabeth Hughes, a 67-year-old children's ministry volunteer, said she initially hated AI. "I like creativity," she said. But her husband uses the tools constantly, and between him and the pastor, she said, "they've won me over."

For investors, the trend signals broadening AI adoption into sectors that have historically been slow to digitize. The US has roughly 350,000 religious congregations, according to the Hartford Institute for Religion Research. If even a fraction follow the trajectory of Stetler's 500-member Facebook group, the addressable market for AI tools tailored to faith organizations could be significant. ACST, a church technology provider serving nearly 50,000 faith organizations, recently launched MP-MCP, a secure AI gateway that connects church management data to assistants like Claude — suggesting the industry sees opportunity. The company reported that 64 churches joined its AI pilot program within 90 days.

Stetler worries about a future generation of AI-reliant pastors. "I'm really torn," he said. "I would recommend guys use it lightly." What concerns him is not the tool itself but what it could let a lazier version of himself get away with. He quoted Isaiah 29:13 — a passage condemning hypocrisy — as a warning label for his own habits. Then he turned back to his two monitors and kept prompting.

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