Administration: AI can replicate a lot of mundane tasks, like organising diaries or taking minutes in a meeting (Zoom has an automatic function built in that will provide you with meeting summary notes). Whilst they may not be perfect, it’s often helpful in church settings where human resources are limited and administration skills lacking. 

Church Social Media: AI can assist in content creation by drafting social media posts, or suggesting creative ideas for events or campaigns. Automated social media management tools can schedule posts, analyse engagement metrics, and optimise content for wider reach.

Data analysis: Churches can use AI algorithms to analyse data collected from various sources, such as attendance records, donation information, and member demographics. This can provide insights into attendance trends, preferences, and other patterns that can help in planning events, outreach initiatives, and resource allocation. There are now AI tools built into Microsoft packages like Excel.

Sermon ideas: AI algorithms can analyse individual preferences, past sermons, and biblical texts to offer personalised sermon suggestions, ideas and templates. I wouldn’t recommend letting AI write you’re entire sermon! But it can offer helpful insite or generate new ideas as a starting point.

Prayers: exactly the same as Sermons above, AI can be used to generate prayers, or prayer ideas that you can refine. Often best to use it as a starting point for ideas. Or utilise it for more creativity by asking for a poem or being specific about the style of language. 

Photos: AI can generate images and graphics, which often are not as good as the real thing, but in many churches where photography skills are limited, generating Methodist images can be helpful (for social media, websites, publicity, flyers etc.) Particualarly as there are limited options for finding equivilent images online, as most are taken in America or The Church of England. 

Canva
If you already use Canva for designing graphics or posters for you church (which I would highly recommend) then it already has AI tools built in. You can generate text, images, custom designs and more using AI. Or expand an existing photograph to fill the space using AI to generate the rest of the picture!

Microsoft Copilot
Microsoft have AI tools built into most of their products now. Copilot is a rival to Chat GPT and given many of us already have Microsoft accounts, it makes accessing some AI features a lot easier. I now use Microsoft’s Image Creator as my default. Do you prefer Copilot or Chat GPT? They have become my go-to search engine instead of Google, and this is a good way to use them. 

Zoom Companion
Let AI help draft emails and chat messages, summarize meetings and chat threads, improve brainstorming with colleagues, and more — all in the easy-to-use Zoom experience you know and love. 

Descript
Automatically transcribes transcipts from a video or audio source. Can also automatically add subtitles (captions) to your videos. Easily turn your sermon video (or livestream) into a blog post. Or use AI to improve and edit audio for a video or podcast.