Convention 2025 Sermon Texts:Isaiah 55:10-11Matthew 13:1-9 “Let’s take a moment. Close your eyes and picture a bright spring morning. The sky is blue, the air is crisp and imagine you are standing in a newly plowed field—a New England sort of field—with wet mud surrounding big granite rocks, all lit by a warm spring sun. You have a heavy cloth bag slung over your neck, filled with all sorts of seeds: little ones, big ones, […]
My address to the 234th Convention of the Episcopal Diocese of Rhode Island2025 Have Faith 401 — Convention Address A number of years ago, at a meeting of General Convention, I heard that a bishop from Central Africa had said something that has stayed with me since. I was chairing the Legislative Committee on Evangelism at the time, and in the course of our deliberations we were reminded, very quietly, “Conversion is a sovereign act […]
Artificial Intelligence makes an alluring promise: a frictionless life. Already, it is possible to summon almost anything with a voice command or a swipe. A pizza arrives when we want it, wherever we are. Some speculate that soon enough, our personal digital servants will anticipate our cravings before we are even aware of them. The moment we begin to feel a pang of hunger for our favorite slice, it will already be on its way. […]
I was honored to be invited to be one of the Episcopalians invited to this past week’s AI Future’s Conference that was held in Minnesota. It was a rich and ecumenical meeting, with papers delivered, working groups organized and lots of serendipitous conversation. This piece by the Dean of Chapel at General Seminary in NYC provides both an overview and a suggestion of the most generative way people of faith can respond to rapid spread […]
Opinion | Selfishness Is Not a Virtue – The New York Times: (gift link) America has always been a country with lots of Christian citizens, but it has not always behaved like a Christian country, and for reasons that resonate again today. An old error is new. Too many Christians are transforming Christianity into a vertical faith, one that focuses on your personal relationship with God at the expense of the horizontal relationship you have […]
In an article on the BBC website, Pallab Ghosh writes: The danger is how AI and our relationships with it will change us. That seems more immediate than worries about AI going amok.
AI Chatbots Offer Spiritual Answers. Religious Scholars Explain Why: There is something irresistible about hearing that you alone have a connection to something secret or even divine. “AI can infer the preferences and beliefs of the person interacting with it, encouraging a person to go down rabbit trails and embracing self-aggrandizement they didn’t know they wanted in the first place,” explains Yii-Jan Lin, a professor at Yale Divinity School who has written about the apocalyptic […]
Altruism improves happiness and well-being, research finds – The Washington Post: “Finding joy in helping others is fundamental to who we are as a species,” said Elizabeth Dunn, a professor of psychology at the University of British Columbia. American volunteering and charitable giving have been on the decline in recent years. But helping others may set up a positive feedback loop: Because doing good feels good, altruism can beget more altruism and better well-being. “If […]
At Bible Study for the Homeless, a Search for Meaning – The New York Times: Religion is often overlooked as a source of resilience among the poor, but the Lamb Center’s Bible study is in its 33rd year, and seats can be hard to find. Some people come to listen, some to vent, some to mull the parables through fogs of addiction or mental illness. They seek hope, but even when hope proves elusive the […]
The Reformed doctrine of the “total depravity of humanity” has implications today for how we order our lives here in the USA. I hadn’t thought of it until Hankins drew this distinction in his writing.
