Artificial Intelligence and Church Summit Held in Nashville
At the 2026 Artificial Intelligence and Church Summit held in Nashville, clergy and indigenous leaders addressed the intersection of artificial intelligence with religious services and the environmental impacts of data.
Gathering in Nashville, Tennessee, church leaders and indigenous representatives met at the annual gathering to discuss the relationship between artificial intelligence technologies and ancient wisdom traditions.
Opening Session and Participation Details of the Summit
The 2026 Artificial Intelligence and Church Summit, held in Nashville, Tennessee, brought clergy together from August 24 to 28.
While approximately 50 church leaders attended the event in person, numerous participants followed the sessions online and evaluated the impacts of artificial intelligence.
Survey Results and Theological Approaches
Organization leaders Scott Hughes stated that 61 percent of participants regularly use artificial intelligence and 74 percent support this technology.
Hughes referred to the Pope's encyclical on artificial intelligence in order to ground the discussions on the foundation of human dignity and environmental stewardship.
Data Colonialism and Environmental Impact Discussions
Opening speaker Mackenzie Roberts shared with participants the local resistance waged against the conversion of agricultural land for tech parks.
Roberts emphasized that the expansion of data centers leads to serious environmental problems such as water consumption and resource extraction, which constitutes data colonialism.
The Importance of Ancestral Intelligence and Human Relations
Chebon Kernell stated that artificial intelligence and data centers are part of the history of colonialism and capitalism affecting indigenous peoples.
Kernell noted that artificial intelligence chatbots cannot replace human interaction, stating that human bonds and memory are of vital importance in matters such as language learning.