Christian group touts 'ethical' tech features as concerns over out-of-control AI tools persist

By Fox News · Fox News

The leader of a Christian ministry that built its own artificial intelligence application to guide users in their spiritual journey warns companies developing AI systems need to implement "ethical guidelines" to ensure their technology doesn't harm people. Ligonier Ministries president and CEO Chris Larson says that the true highest intelligence is God, and shared a new tool his group created to help answer questions people my have from a faith-based perspective. "It's interesting that [President Donald Trump] even referred to artificial intelligence now as 'superintelligence,'" Larson told Fox News Digital. "Of course, Christians — and, really, all of us — have access to the 'superintelligece,' the one who has created the universe." CHRISTIAN UNIVERSITY AIMS TO PRODUCE 'IRREPLACEABLE' GRADUATES AS AI RESHAPES HIGHER EDUCATION The mission of the Florida-based organization, founded by the late Christian theologian R.C. Sproul, is to proclaim, teach and defend the holiness of God "in all its fullness to as many people as possible." Part of accomplishing that mission was building an app that the organization calls "Grow." "It's dedicated to helping Christians to better understand the Bible and theology and to go deeper in their faith, put down roots, if you will," Larson said of the new tool. "And so this app has 50 years of teaching in it from more than 800 different teachers, of course, grounded in Dr. R.C. Sproul's lifetime of teaching." The app draws from a library of tens of thousands of pieces of content help users in their faith journey looking to obtain answers to critical questions. Inside Grow is an "intelligent answer assistant" which can answer questions from users from a faith-based perspective. But building an Grow for Christian users required putting a great deal of thought into the ethics of the model, Larson explained. WILLIAM BENNETT, JON HAGE: AI CAN MIMIC A TEACHER, BUT IT CANNOT SHEPHERD A SOUL "Now, it's not trying to pretend it's a person or any…