61% of Churchgoers Are Worried About AI and Christianity. They’re Right To Be.

April 26, 2026

A 2026 Lifeway Research study found that three in five Protestant churchgoers in the United States are worried about artificial intelligence’s influence on Christianity. Among Evangelicals, that number climbs to 67%.

We think they’re right to be worried.

We also think most of the AI tools being marketed to Christians right now are doing little to address the concerns the survey actually surfaced. So we want to take those concerns seriously — one by one — and explain how Polaris was built differently.

The concerns are specific, and they are legitimate

The Lifeway data is worth reading carefully. When pastors were asked what worries them about AI in ministry, their answers were not abstract. Eighty-four percent said AI-generated content contains errors that require editorial correction. Eighty-one percent said it is difficult to ensure AI tools draw only on reliable sources. Seventy-six percent said biases may be embedded in how AI systems reach their conclusions. Sixty-two percent worried that those using AI are not disclosing it as a collaborator. And fifty-five percent said God has always communicated through human beings, and AI is not a person.

These are not the concerns of people who fear technology. These are the concerns of people who have actually used ChatGPT, Gemini, or Claude — and noticed that when those tools answer a question about Scripture, they tend to flatten contested doctrine into a kind of polite theological neutrality. They smooth over inerrancy. They hedge on the resurrection. They treat orthodox Christology as one tradition among many.

That isn’t a bug. It’s the design. General-purpose AI is built to serve every user, of every conviction, simultaneously. Which is exactly why it cannot serve theologically convictional Christians well.

What Polaris is not

Before we say what Polaris is, it is worth saying clearly what it isn’t.

Polaris is not a sermon generator. The Lifeway study found that 43% of churchgoers oppose pastors using AI to prepare sermons, with 24% strongly opposed. We agree with the instinct behind that opposition. Preaching is a calling — a man, called by God, opening the Word for His people. We will never build a tool that pretends to do that work, and we would not want to.

Polaris is not a replacement for Bible study. It is a study aid, in the same category as a concordance, a study Bible, or a commentary. It is meant to be used with an open Bible, not instead of one.

Polaris is not a replacement for the Holy Spirit’s work in illuminating Scripture. No tool can do that. We would be horrified by anyone who thought one could.

Polaris is not theologically neutral. And we believe that is a feature, not a flaw.

What Polaris is

“All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.”

2 Timothy 3:16–17

Polaris is an AI Bible study platform built for theologically conservative Christians. It is committed, by design, to biblical inerrancy — the conviction that Scripture, in its original autographs, is without error. It is committed to historical-grammatical hermeneutics — interpreting passages in their original linguistic, historical, and literary context, not retrofitting them to modern preferences. And it is committed to orthodox Christology — the historic, creedal confession of Christ as fully God and fully man, crucified and bodily risen.

These commitments are not afterthoughts layered onto a general-purpose model. They are the system prompt. Every question asked of Polaris is answered through that lens.

Addressing the concerns directly

Return to the Lifeway data and consider how a Christian-built tool ought to answer each worry.

On errors and reliable sources: Polaris is grounded in the biblical text itself, not in the open internet. When you ask about a passage, the model is working from Scripture and from a defined theological framework — not from whatever happens to rank on Google for that verse. Errors still happen. AI is a tool, not an oracle. But the surface area for error is smaller when the source material is bounded and the interpretive lens is disclosed.

On embedded bias: Every AI tool has a bias. The question is whether that bias is named or hidden. Ours is named, on the homepage, in plain language. You know what Polaris believes before you ask it anything.

On disclosure: Polaris is, transparently, an AI tool. It is not a pastor, a substitute for the local church, or a stand-in for a human teacher. We say so explicitly, and we say so often.

On the conviction that God communicates through human beings: We share it. Polaris exists to help believers engage Scripture more deeply between Sundays — not to replace the means of grace God has actually appointed. The Word preached, the sacraments, the gathered church, the counsel of mature believers: none of these have a software substitute. None ever will.

Where Polaris fits

For individual believers, Polaris helps you study a passage you don’t yet understand, prepare for the sermon you’re about to hear, or follow up on a question your pastor’s text raised but didn’t have time to answer.

For ministry leaders, our forthcoming Ministry tier will support small group preparation, discussion questions, and study guide creation — the kind of work that has always required hours of careful study, and still does, but with a research assistant that shares your doctrinal commitments.

What it will never do is preach for you, pastor for you, or pray for you. Those are works the Lord has given to His people, His ministers, and His Spirit. We have no interest in pretending otherwise.

The 61% of churchgoers worried about AI and Christianity are not being alarmist. They are watching a powerful new technology enter their spiritual lives and asking, reasonably, whether the people building it share their convictions about the Bible.

For most AI tools, the honest answer is no.

We built Polaris so that, for at least one tool, the answer could be yes.

AI built by believers, for believers. Honest with the text. Helpful with the question.

Questions people ask about AI and the Bible