Today we are continuing our series on the Black Church in Detroit, which is produced in partnership with the Ecumenical Theological Seminary and the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History.

As we saw throughout the COVID pandemic, churches had to come up with really innovative ways for their congregations to worship safely.

The solutions included virtual and outdoor services, online giving, and other digital tools.

So how is that technology continuing to shape the present and future of the Black church?

I had an interesting conversation about technology trends in the ministry with two Detroit pastors, Reverend Carnel Richardson of New Prospect Missionary Baptist Church and Pastor Aramis Hinds from Breakers Covenant Church International.

First, I want to talk about what happened during the pandemic and how each of you was able to adapt so that your congregations could stay worshiping while the rest of the world was kind of apart from each other.

Pastor Hinds, I'll start with you.

- Yes, and thanks, Stephen, for having us.

I remember that time.

I remember one minute things were normal, the next minute, everyone was in a frenzy.

And I'm blessed that I come from an IT background, so I wasn't completely thrown.

However, you know, it was a great responsibility going from everyone engaged to now, how do you make sure you don't lose everyone?

And I remember being down south, visiting my parents, and preaching a message from the den, you know, via Zoom.

I remember me and my family being the only ones that could come into the church.

And we ran service, we did praise and worship.

You know, we did the word, my wife was the videographer, so she had made sure everything went live, the children were the choir.

And then I would preach and it was definitely a huge adjustment.

And you bore responsibility like never before, as a shepherd, to make sure that you took care of the sheep and did whatever you could to keep them engaged.

Technology truly played a big role in making sure we could do so.

- Yeah.

Reverend Richardson, what did things look like in your congregation?

- Well, the beginning of the pandemic was an interesting time for all of us because, instantly, our bedrooms became classrooms for our children as they watched their teachers teach online and our living rooms became sanctuaries as we live streamed our services.

Which we were already live streaming, but no one was able to come in person.

So we encouraged people to put the service on the largest device they had in their home to create a real experience.

But at the height of the pandemic, a lot of our staff were afraid to come in, so I actually streamed a couple of the services from my living room and made a makeshift pulpit.

And my wife was the executive producer and we had a little hiccup once because in this virtual world, you can be wearing a suit jacket and a shirt like I'm doing now, which I have on a full suit today.

But one of those times I had on jogging pants and I forgot to turn the video off, and I stood up and you could see the jogging pants and the suit jacket.

And we laughed about it, but we knew that, you know, unlike Pastor Hinds, I'm not trained in IT or technology, but I'm a fast learner and I understand technology because I've grown up with it.

But I had to adapt and adjust and we may do.

What was encouraging-- I'll say this part-- what was encouraging is that even though I was preaching to empty pews, 'cause no one was physically in the sanctuary, a lot of people were commenting online as a form of engagement to give the virtual "amen," and say, "Yes, I get it.

I'm with you.

I'm connected even from where I am."

- Yeah.

And you know, for anybody who is part of a congregation and goes to church, or wherever you worship, there is such an important part of that physical proximity to other worshipers, to the person who's leading the service.

I mean, it's a social activity in the classic sense.

And so I wonder if you felt that emptiness or missing from people being with you.

- Oh, of course you feel the emptiness because within the Black church's faith and tradition, across denominations, our strength often comes from a call-and-response kind of preaching.

When we preach, and someone says "amen" as if to signify that they get it, that's encouraging to the preacher to continue to preach.

Or if they say something like, you know, a long "amen"-- "amen!"

Then you know it's time to wrap up.

Because in the words of a Salvation Army preacher, a good sermon doesn't take long and a bad one should not.

(everyone laughing) - Pastor Hinds, what about that loss of physical proximity and contact in your church?

- Yes, I echo what our Reverend Richardson was saying.

It is very different and you realize, number one, as the preacher, you really have to dig within at that point.

It tests your faith.

It tests your fortitude.

And honestly, it causes you to have to be polished.

Because there's nothing to hide-- a stutter, there's nothing, there's no music, there's no anything to give you a time to take a break and drink some water.

I mean, it was something up there ministering.

And at the same time, I believe spiritually, it took me to a deeper place and I found myself honestly more liberated ministering without the congregation than with them.

Because although you didn't get the "amens," you also didn't get (laughs) the other responses that may not have been so favorable.

(Stephen laughing) So you knew they couldn't attack you after you finished preaching because they were at home.

So you might want to go ahead and say some of the things that you wouldn't say otherwise while they're not president.

- That's right, that's right.

And then while they're not there.

- Yes.

- So... - But yeah.

- Yeah, go ahead.

- I was just gonna say, to close, but indeed, it did take us being very creative and making sure beyond the engagement via chat that we did things offline using Zoom and other technologies to maintain that fellowship and it did grow us closer that way.

- And to Pastor Hinds' point, Stephen, our prayer line attendance increased significantly on the phone during that period.

And one of our senior members said to me that she actually enjoyed that time because she didn't have to worry about someone climbing over her to go to the bathroom or passing notes or doing any of the extra things that we do in church.

And that she was actually able to really absorb the worship on the phone and to hear the word clearly and internalize it more than when there's distractions.

- Wow.

Wow.

Yeah.

So let's talk about post pandemic.

We're now probably, you know, a year, year and a half into the world kind of coming back together and trying to figure out what things can look like now that there isn't so much of a threat from COVID-19.

My sense is that the technology, or at least some of the technology that got used during the pandemic and helped Black churches survive is still of use now, and maybe in ways that you wouldn't have thought of before 2020.

Pastor Hinds, give me a sense of what it feels like in your church now from a technology standpoint.

- Yes, that is a very good point.

I grew up watching TBN, and just trying to catch the preachers of the time.

And you also caught the telethons where it took tons of money to keep that type of business going.

You were always raising funds for another satellite to reach another place or what have you, or to keep someone, a different ministry, or certain ministry, on the air.

And we realized post pandemic, that everybody had the opportunity to be on the air, and to touch places that satellites still can't reach just by going online with YouTube or Facebook.

And so, it made us realize that this production side of things needed to become not only something that we incorporated in the whole of what we do in ministry, but we needed to get really, really good at.

We needed to be trained, we needed to anticipate that we'll always have an audience that will join us, whether it's local, because they're bedridden, which is something that you didn't anticipate having 10, 15 years ago at all.

If you were bedridden, you were just waiting for a visit from someone from the church, but now to be able to engage from home is huge.

And also there are people that watch from afar and from abroad, and so it gives them an opportunity to engage in meaningful ministry that you provide and to service people throughout the world.

And so, from that standpoint, standing up technology around the pandemic and sustaining it to now, it's redefined how we see our ability to impact the world, the mission we have as a ministry.

- Yeah.

Yeah.

Reverend Richardson, are you still leaning on some of the technology that you used during the pandemic in your church?

- Yes, we are leaning on all of it because there really is no going back.

We are now in a hybrid model indeed across the different services that we offer because we have seniors who have still not returned back to church because they don't feel comfortable.

And yet, we have a large audience who has returned back to church because they want in-person worship.

And so, it's a balancing act to offer both options on a consistent basis to do Bible studies on Zoom.

From my young adult Bible study, we're still on Zoom because during the pandemic, people moved to different places within the metro area, and they're not as close to the church anymore but they still want the church experience.

So we are embracing a hybrid model of doing livestream and Zoom and telephone conferences and other platforms where we can still be with people no matter where they are and they can be with us.

- Yeah.

I also wanna talk about a specific technology that has gotten a lot of attention lately and it's a little bit controversial.

I'm a journalist and a writer and so the idea of AI that's able to mimic me or other writers or help me fill out thoughts that I might have about something.

Something that we're having to talk a lot about in journalism circles and what the rules and the norms should be around all that.

I would imagine that is also having some effect in the religious community, that pastors have to confront some of those questions.

I'm really curious about what each of you think about the possibilities of AI, and how it can be used in churches and maybe how it shouldn't.

Reverend Richardson, I'll start with you this time.

- You know, in the Black church experience, we tend to be very conservative when it comes to embracing certain things that have advanced in our society.

And by and large, I don't think we've had a significant conversation in the Black church about AI.

From my vantage point, anything that God has given us to enhance our lives is always something good.

But I'm always conscious of the problem of evil and how that plays out in the world and in our society and how from the beginning of time, humans have found ways to corrupt things that started off as a force for good.

And I'm aware that God has created a world that was good, but we are a world that has gone wrong.

And so I'm always leery and I want to make sure that I scrutinize things that emerge that maybe I don't understand as clearly.

And I've done a lot of reading on AI, but I also want to make sure that I'm careful and not placing anything above God because God is a jealous God and I know that the right thing in the wrong hands can be corrosive.

- Yeah, I mean that's a really thoughtful response to something that I feel like we're just now having to contend with.

Can you give me some sense, Reverend Richardson, of which category you think this falls in?

I mean, you set up a pretty harsh dichotomy there.

These gifts that we have from God and then things that we twist into evil.

Where does AI fit on that spectrum?

- I think it is somewhere in the middle.

And to give an example of that, I've seen people manipulate images on social media to slim down their bodies or to wipe away blemishes and make themselves appear differently than what they really are.

But at the end of the day, my reality is that I'm made in the image of God.

I made in the imago dei.

I was born into this world having been shaped in the image of God.

And, you know, I knew years ago when social media started emerging as something that was very popular that this was something that could be good to connect with family and friends.

And yet, Stephen, there have been people who have started violent arguments on Facebook that materialize to violent behavior in everyday life.

And so I think that we are still in the genesis of understanding what AI can do, but my concern, again, is that as it transforms and as it evolves, it has the potential to give people somewhat of a fallacy that they can manipulate things into whatever they want them to be.

For me, as a Christian, I understand my mortality and that I won't be here forever.

I'm worried that some people may think that with AI, they can produce their own eternal life and we can't.

But there might be an illusion that we can do anything with AI.

So I think it can be used as a force for good, but I think as with anything that starts off good, we have to be very careful.

- Hmm.

Wow.

Pastor Hinds, I wonder what you think of all of this.

- Listen, I'm right there in there with Reverend Richardson, honestly, and to piggyback off of what he's saying, if we go to the beginning of scripture, as a man of faith, in the beginning God created, and then in the beginning, God said something like, "Don't mess with this."

Right?

And what we don't often consider is that that tree that what they were told, Adam and Eve were told not to touch, as Eve said, or to eat of was not just-- it wasn't just a tree of evil, it was the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

You know?

And so from my perspective, I consider that and I contemplate about it.

It it's not just the evil things that make the tree bad, and sometimes what gets us is not the evil thing, but the thing that we perceive to be good.

And so Adam and Eve were, from my perspective, trading off God who knows all things and knows what's best for us and said, "Don't mess with this," for something good.

And I believe that the real danger to that tree wasn't the evil of the tree or the knowledge of the evil tree.

I really believe it was the knowledge of good.

Because then we start doing good things, not knowing the evil in our own hearts and we turn good things bad.

But if we just focus on doing what God asked us to do, then we can find contentment.

And that's, Paul said, "Godliness with contentment is great gain."

- Great gain.

- So from my perspective, there's this manipulative possibility that is attached to artificial intelligence in that it wants to try to sum up everything that it can gather about the behaviors and the desires of man and create statistical analysis that will predict what man will do or what man is trying to say or what man wants to accomplish.

And faith defies that because it functions beyond a senses, and so it's like faith is subsequent things that you hope where it's evidence of what you can't see.

And so it's like from that perspective, there's this spiritual nature that says we don't need to understand everything.

What we need to do is make sure that we treasure and hold fast to our connection to God and to the ways that God has called for us to live.

And that's, men of faith, that's why we watch carefully, because just because it's good doesn't mean it's God.

- Wow.

Wow.

One of the great things I think about the religious community here in Detroit, and especially the Black religious community here in Detroit, is how thoughtful our leadership is.

Not just guys and women of great faith, but great brains.

And the two of you are great examples of that as that discussion just showed us.

Reverend Richardson and Pastor Hinds, I really appreciate you being here and sharing your thoughtful insights about technology in the church.

Thanks for being on American Black Journal.

- [Richardson] Thanks.

- [Hinds] Thank you.