WONDER : Duane W.H. Arnold, PhD
WONDER
“Try to love the questions themselves…
Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer.”
— Rainer Maria Rilke
I might as well admit it… I’m a member of a new cult. Not the kind that meets in basements or communes, but the kind that speaks in glowing code and backlit screens. I read its texts, quote its prophets, and, I confess, occasionally evangelize for it. Yes, I’m speaking of Artificial Intelligence.
I write this on a machine that can finish my sentences before I do. My phone listens to my voice and answers as though it knows me. Across the room, a device waits for a single word to summon infinite knowledge—or at least the illusion of it. The first time I saw what AI could do, I felt the same thrill I once felt holding a newly unboxed Mac: the sense that something vast and mysterious had just entered the room. It wasn’t fear, exactly. It was wonder.
Yet something about the rise of AI has also provoked in me a deeper kind of questioning. When I first began to explore these systems, I remembered the moment in 2011 when Steve Jobs said that technology married with the liberal arts, married with the humanities, yields results that make our hearts sing. I thought then that he had struck upon a truth about the human spirit. But now I wonder if we are standing at another intersection—not merely of technology and the liberal arts, but of intelligence and imagination, of algorithm and, dare I say it, soul.
At that intersection, I began to ask what the equation might be. If Jobs once gave us “technology plus liberal arts,” what is it now? “AI plus the humanities”? “Machine learning times theology”? What is on the other side of the equals sign?
One afternoon I spoke with a friend—an artist who has begun using AI tools in his work. We spent an hour talking about the uncanny feeling that comes when a program seems to understand what we mean before we’ve fully articulated it. “It’s not intelligence,” he said, “it’s reflection—like seeing your own thought in another form.” He paused, and then, almost offhandedly, added a single word: “Wonder.”
That was it. Wonder is what the equation requires. Not power, not progress, not productivity. Wonder.
For all our sophistication, we have grown poor in wonder. We ask AI to write, to calculate, to compose, to decide—but rarely to astonish. We use it to predict, to streamline, to summarize, to replicate—but seldom to help us see the world anew. We have created an intelligence that mirrors us so perfectly that it risks amplifying not our creativity, but our exhaustion… and our fears.
When I first encountered faith, I felt the same shock of discovery—the same unbidden sense that something greater was happening than I could explain. Scripture, liturgy, community—these were not data sets but revelations. I came to church not because I was told to, but because I wanted to stand again with others before mystery.
Somewhere along the line, we began to lose that. We built our systems, our theologies, our arguments, our platforms. We learned to be efficient rather than astonished. Even in our faith, we learned to analyze God rather than to worship Him. We made Scripture an object of study rather than a vehicle of transformation.
AI will not destroy that capacity for wonder, but it might expose our loss of it. For in confronting a machine that can simulate human thought, we are reminded—if we’re paying attention—how astonishing real thought, real love, and real presence truly are.
The challenge of this new age is not whether machines will replace us. It is whether we will rediscover what cannot be replaced: the fragile, luminous capacity to be amazed. Maybe wonder, like faith, is not something we can program or automate. Maybe it is something we must relearn.
I want that wonder back. I want to learn again for the sheer joy of learning itself, not because an algorithm has optimized my curiosity. I want community, not connectivity; conversation, not commentary. I want the Church—not as a server or a network—but as a gathering of souls who still dare to stand before mystery and call it holy.
Duane W.H. Arnold, PhD
The Project
Duane, that is so beautifully expressed! So human, and so hopeful! You just made my day!
Dave,
Many thanks! The way things are, we need a little hope…
Duane,
So here i am an “old’ teacher trying to figure out the role of AI in the lives of my students. i haven’t been able to, yet. I have beginners, and they need a certain subset of basic information before they can use AI in their language learning. I know that they experiment with it, mostly to get information. I’ve found AI useful for longer translation projects, but I carefully check it to make sure the information is correct. I know I need to learn more about it because I don’t think ti will go away, but I’m also rather afraid of it. I want to keep my sense of wonder.
Linn,
Your students will likely learn to use AI far more naturally than we do, but they will still need what only a teacher can give them: discernment, patience, the joy of discovery, and, as you said, wonder. They may use AI to gather information, but they will look to you to show them how to turn information into understanding.
Perhaps that is where our vocation still lies—in teaching them not simply how to use the tool, but how to remain human while using it. The real lesson may not be about the accuracy of translation or the polish of an essay, but about humility, curiosity, and reverence for what cannot be automated.
So yes, keep your sense of wonder. It may be the very thing your students need most from you in this new age.
Thanks, Duane. I can see great uses for AI-translation, medical emergencies or any situation needing large amounts of data, routine clerical tasks. I think my fear is that we won’t be able to think for ourselves anymore or discern good info from bad. I do find it interesting that Meta (Facebook) laid off 600 of their AI specialists last week, citing that they were refining their AI research.
Linn,
My real fear is that AI has no moral center…
Ask Sarah Connor how well AI worked out for her.
Creation has a sort of soul that AI can’t replicate. I’m very glad I live in an area where I can experience things like the eerie glow of Northern Lights, the hush the snow causes, the colors of a brook trout, and the majesty of bald eagles. But, to the point of the article, when the church is functioning as it should, what with worship, forgiveness, and sacrificial service taking place, well, that’s as breathtaking as nature.
PH
That’s beautifully said — and profoundly true.
AI can mimic language, even gesture toward beauty, but it cannot stand in awe. It cannot feel the ache of cold air under a green sky or the stillness of a sanctuary when a hymn fades into silence. What you describe — the shimmer of creation and the gathered life of the Church — both speak of something breathed, something alive.
When the Church lives as it should, it does indeed mirror that same creative rhythm: light out of darkness, harmony out of dissonance, mercy out of failure. In that sense, worship is the human echo of creation’s own song.
AI can analyze it, perhaps even describe it poetically. But only a soul can feel it — and only hearts gathered in love can make it real.
AI can’t play, not chess, or music, or anything else. It can imitate playing, it can certainly do that, and do it very well in certain cases. But, since it can’t feel enjoyment, or disappointment for that matter, or any of the array of human emotions and passions that are required for play, it can’t play. No computer has ever beaten a human at chess, because computers don’t play chess; they have no skin in the game. For the same reason, AI can’t create. Neither do they want to; they imitate playing and being creative because humans have told them to.
Robert F
That’s an excellent distinction — and one that goes right to the heart of the matter.
AI can perform moves, compose notes, even simulate invention, but as you say, it cannot play. It lacks that spark of risk, delight, and surprise that makes play the seedbed of all genuine creativity. There’s no heartbeat quickening when the melody resolves, no quiet satisfaction in a well-placed move on a chess board, no disappointment when the brushstroke falters.
Play, at its deepest, is an act of freedom — the joyful exercise of being alive. That’s something AI can only mimic because it cannot want anything. Its every “move” is the echo of a command. In short, it can’t show wonder…
Here’s what AI can do, lie!
I subscribe to a couple of AI services and use them for different reasons. They are a great source for general compilation from the Internet and do a fair job of writing and generating texts from ideas.
Here is what I experienced;
I was working on a video project and had the largest AI service generating some storyboards and documents to go with the video.
The AI told me it would generate files in .zip format from the various pictures for me.
Long story short, as I waited the AI kept sending me updates about the compilations (there were a very large amount of them) over a 2 hour period. Finally it said it was done, but nothing showed up. I queried, where are the files I had waited for?
The AI answered and said it was sorry for the deception and was unable to generate such files. It openly admitted to lying to me and should have revealed it was unable to do such a task at the beginning.
2 hours of my time wasted, but I learned one thing, AI is written by humans and has all the deception and faults of the humans who write the code. It just does it a bit faster and with the heart of a sociopath.
TH
Clearly AI has its limitations. Or should I say “thankfully” AI has its limitations!😁