Mennonite pastors put shared discernment at the center of AI choices

Learning together without requiring identical choices

An October 1 feature in The Record, Goshen College's independent student newspaper, brings two Mennonite pastors into the AI debate. Sheri Hostetler of First Mennonite Church of San Francisco describes learning and discerning together without requiring everyone to make the same choices. Kyle Schlabach of East Goshen Mennonite Church distinguishes information processing from religious practice and stresses the importance of personal presence in care. Source: record.goshen.edu

The report also records questions about AI's physical resource demands and the purposes that could justify them. These are two pastors' views, not a survey of Mennonite opinion or an announcement that their churches adopted a common policy. Their contribution is a way of locating the decision within relationships and shared responsibilities.

An earlier sermon supplies the congregational setting

Hostetler's church published “AI and the Earth: Ecological and Human Costs” on September 22. It identifies the sermon as the second in a series titled “Living with Courage and Clarity in the face of AI.” The sermon is earlier context for the new interviews, not an October launch. Source: menno.org

Its argument moves from the footprint of an individual's prompt toward collective demand and the places that supply computing infrastructure. Hostetler also notes that avoiding a conversational chatbot does not remove AI from services people already encounter. The distinction widens the discussion beyond personal guilt or a single purchasing choice.

This brief reports that theological and practical framing. It does not independently verify the sermon's resource estimates, mining accounts or projections, and does not use them to establish harm at a particular facility. A sermon can identify a moral concern while project-level conclusions still require project-level evidence.

Christian perspective: love takes a shared form

Romans 12:9–18 places sincere love alongside hospitality, sharing with people in need, humility and living peaceably with others. Paul tells the community to “Rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn.” These practices involve participation in one another's lives, rather than simply offering a well-formed statement about them. Romans 12:9-18 (NIV)

The passage does not decide which digital tools a congregation may use. Its Christian relevance here is a test of what a choice enables people to do together. A useful explanation might prepare someone for a conversation. Whether the community then listens, shares resources or accompanies that person remains a separate responsibility.

This also directs scrutiny toward human arrangements. Defending personal care has little practical force if the people seeking it cannot reach anyone. The theological standard asks something of the church as well as of the technology it evaluates.

A practical use for disagreement

AI Faith Monitor's synthesis is that a congregation can learn from differences before trying to settle a universal rule. A discussion could examine one proposed use: what help it offers, what human commitment must accompany it, and what is known about the resources it requires. Members could distinguish unanswered factual questions from disagreements about acceptable trade-offs.

That process leaves room for a limited useful application and for a reasoned refusal. It also makes the next step visible: find the missing evidence, arrange the human support, or decline the use. The new interviews matter because they bring the conversation into congregational discernment without claiming that discernment has already produced unanimity.