A Catechism on Technology

Here’s a short catechism on technology. I found it helpful to think through a biblical and theological perspective on this important topic.

Technology and the Creation Mandate

1. What is technology?

Technology is using knowledge and skills to make and use things and methods that solve problems, meet needs, and extend our capacities.

2. Where did technology come from?

Technology is part of God’s mandate for humans to cultivate creation and rule over the earth (Genesis 1:28; Psalm 8:6). God created us in his image to cultivate creation’s latent potential.

3. Is technology good or bad?

Technology is powerful. It can be used well to steward creation and promote human flourishing. But because of the disobedience of Adam and Eve, technology is cursed with thorns and thistles, and can tempt and shape us in harmful ways.

Technology After the Fall

4. How can technology tempt us?

Technology can tempt us to ignore God’s word, attempt to transcend human limits, and live independently of God, trusting in our own abilities rather than in him (Genesis 3:4-5; 11:1-9). It makes us feel like we can be everywhere, know everything, and fix every weakness rather than accept our creaturely limits. It promises quick power, but bypasses the slow process of growth that makes us wise, resilient, and loving.

5. What does Scripture teach us about technology after the Fall?

Technology can serve God’s purposes in a fallen world (Genesis 4:17–22). The same tools can also tempt us to reach beyond our limits and seek security and significance apart from God (Genesis 11:1-9). Scripture shows that we can use technology for worship and faithful service (Exodus 31) or idolatry, turning our works into substitutes for him (Exodus 32). When we place our confidence in technology instead of the Lord, we are guilty of spiritual unfaithfulness, placing our hope in human power rather than in God (Psalm 20:7; Proverbs 21:31; Isaiah 31:1–3).

6. How did Jesus and the apostles use technology?

Both Jesus and the Apostle Paul used technology in their vocations. Within their ministries, both Jesus and the apostles used technology sparingly, and not as a substitute for embodied relationships, the church, and personal ministry.

Artificial Intelligence

7. Is AI good or bad?

AI is both good and bad. AI is a form of technology, and it can be used faithfully or unfaithfully, in both helpful and harmful ways.

8. What are some limits of AI?

AI can hallucinate (make errors). It tends to flatter and carries the biases of the people who built it. It can never worship, love, feel, or truly think.

9. What are some good uses of AI?

AI can be helpful for tasks like coding, summarizing, researching, analyzing, and tackling tedious work.

10. What are some unhelpful uses of AI?

It’s unwise to use AI without disclosure so that others believe the work is ours, to use it as a substitute for genuine creative work, to lean on it so heavily that our skills and judgment atrophy, or to use it as a substitute for real, human relationships. It’s also unwise to treat chatbots as persons, especially as a substitute for friends, counsellors, or pastors.

11. What can AI never give us?

AI can never give us what we need most: love, sacrifice, and the capacity to worship. These are gifts that only God and humans created in his image can give.

A Faithful Digital Life

12. What makes it difficult to use technology wisely?

By its very nature, technology is more vivid, distracting, and falsely intimate than our analog lives. Technology also shapes us. Our daily digital habits, repeated over time, train our attention, imagination, and desires, often without us noticing.

13. What are some questions we should ask when we use technology?

First, does this technology help me honour God and love my neighbour? Or is it tempting me to transcend my creaturely limits, put my trust in something other than God, and move me away from serving and loving people?

Second, what is the hidden cost? Every technology contains a tradeoff, usually hidden, and not every tradeoff is worth making.

Third, how is this technology shaping me? We must pay attention to how technology is changing our souls, and lean into practices like Scripture, prayer, worship, and Christian community that shape our souls toward Christ (Romans 12:2).

14. What is our calling regarding technology?

God calls us to use technology with gratitude and discernment as faithful stewards, while keeping our worship, trust, and love fixed on God rather than on what we have made.