Episode 1224: Ask Ben Anything: AI And Communion

0:00All right, we're on all right. I'm gonna start the episode and then we'll we can tell listeners This is our first time together. I've been you know, I put out their movies 2025 and books 2025 But this is your first episode and in like a month So yeah, let me hit that let me hit the music and then and then you can talk about it episode 1,224 I'm gonna name this thing later. I don't know why I call it All right, Ben take it away tell everybody what's been happening in your life? We're virtual tonight Oh, we got a baby. He was born a month early. It's not super premature But enough premature where we wound up in the NICU for a couple of weeks and so you know, we've just been off He's home now everybody's home This week just wasn't Gonna work for just schedule reasons and so one more week off But then we'll be back as normal next week. We'll resume Dante as normal all the all the good stuff that we normally do so I think our virtual episodes have been working out pretty well and

1:00The we're kind of limp in a long here, but I'm excited to get back to normal recording. I'm I'm Hoping to redo the look of this basement before you get back. I've been slowly working on some things So I hope that you're surprised by what it looks like when you return. I'm always surprised Like things shift around and move and it's it's a wild This will be the biggest change. I predict. This is the biggest change since we started like since you started really pay attention Okay, I'll be ready for it. All right, listen as well as we wrap our virtual time here tonight We're talking about doing something for the free feed laying you guys here some fresh side-facristened action But what are we gonna do? What should we talk about? Well, I have a few questions. I've saved up for ask been anything and I don't remember what they are I have them in my inbox, but that's why I can't I couldn't give the title yet because I don't exactly don't we're gonna talk about so looks like I have two questions Ready and let's just take it away. Are you ready fire away? All right, I'm reading this a little bit for the first time Maybe let me if I need to edit this pause out

2:04Okay Okay, you know, I've been studying communion and Eucharist depending on If you're Protestant or Catholic and it looks like I wrote Wow, this is interesting. I I can see I wrote this right after I finished Robert Barron's book. He's a he's a priest. No, he's a bishop. He's a bishop bishop Barron's book on the Eucharist And so I must have had something in mind as I wrote this is I'm just gonna read it It looks like it's notes and a question. I'll mix together. Are you ready? I'm ready as you take in Jesus's blood and body is it replacing parts of you Replace and I am just these are notes. I took down replacing yourself So that you can become more like him and I mean this quickly read the rest of my notes Then you can so just be thinking about how you want to answer this. Yeah, yeah I haven't drank wine as you know, but apparently wine because alcohol has like kind of a burning to it I've not this much of been what I got from reading the book when you drink it feels different than drinking juice could

3:08Communion or Eucharist or whatever you want to call it have some sort of cleaning aspect like who it is The is the burning importance not not physically, but spiritually in some way And so again, I'm just kind of quite it looks like my notes are just Going back and forth between remembrance versus maybe almost a medicine you and I have talked about how it's almost like a medicine Like something that gives you power or empowers you or cleans or purifies you And I have one last note. I hope you're just thinking about how you're gonna answer this Looking up something on from the first part last thing. I'll read here something So communion can be something that unites you with the church body throughout time when you take communion Are you taking communion with everyone that has ever done it at the same time throughout time? So it looks like I have two questions here the time one, but then also the replacing our parts of ourselves and I my guesses that I Parts of this couldn't have been original to me. I unless I just something that the bishop said spark that question So what do I do? You want to talk about time first? You want to talk about our bodies our physical and spiritual bodies well

4:13Wait a second The time part, you know, I think that that is it the proper way of understanding it is that we are all united across time and space So when I take communion or do you only count that for Catholic Catholic Eucharist like? Let's break it down. Let's break it down real quick here when you take the Eucharist You believe or Catholics believe that all Catholics are taking it throughout time together. Is that correct? Yes, by virtue of the fact that what the Eucharist does is a transcends time and space and so they The Eucharistic sacrifice brings us to the moment of the sacrifice of Christ. So we are united in Across time and space with that moment of history. Would you or maybe I should say would Catholics extend that to Protestant? And so do you believe that you and I are always taking communion together? So I would definitely extend it to Eastern Orthodox I would not extend it to Protestants now that doesn't mean that God through

5:16His extraordinary means of grace can't do the same thing, but the reason I went to extend that to Protestants is You know, I'm just giving you my answer. This is an aspect of it. Yeah, it's okay. Right. So number one There are there's no valid apostolic succession within the Protestant Churches And number two, the Eucharistic sacrifice does not have the proper matter in form. So in other words, what I would consider a valid Not I but the church would consider a valid Eucharistic Celebration is not present in the Protestant Churches. That doesn't mean that God can't do God thing So I wouldn't say a definitive no, but I wouldn't say yes in the way that I would for the orthodox and Catholic Churches So I wrote this email that I just read as an ask bed anything note So I don't I again, I just don't know what was something I what was the answer the first part?

6:17Yeah, I'm gonna come back to that I just want to quickly say I don't know if like this thing about wine burning and replacing our bodies I honestly don't remember if that was in this book by the bishop or if I just If it was a note that came to mind as I was reading so I hate to steal someone else's idea But let's just talk about it as if it's my idea. So So I think I might have been thinking as you're taking pieces of him. It's replacing parts of yourself Is that is that what do you think about that? Yeah, I mean, I think that Without really regard to how literal we do or don't want to take that Um, in terms of like the actual physical Punishment of your body through stuff that you eat You know, there is this concept especially in the Eastern Eastern Christianity called theosis That's what I was looking up on my phone. Well, you were asking so I was trying to remember that exact word for it Deification theosis divinization all them essentially mean the same thing which is not that we Oh god, oh you break it up you break it up as well

7:20Yeah, the goal of the Christian life. Hey, I lost it for a second. Sorry, right when you said it's not that Oh, I might have totally lost some here listeners. It's not that we is this better. Yeah, that sounds good Nope, I'm here. Okay, good. Okay. Can you hear me now? Yeah, so the goal isn't necessarily it's not that we become god, but we become like god god wants us to be like him And so the demonization theosis the same type of thing I think another way to understand this is that you know All of the sacraments are means of imputing grace to us and grace does make us more holy It's the sanctification process But really what it boils down to if we want to strip away all the theological language and high hard to understand philosophical concepts and all of that The eucharistic theology boils down to this you are what you eat That's really what it comes down to so that I don't mean that to be flippant But it's literally what we believe that yes, you're taking Christ into you and by that process

8:24God's grace is making you more like Christ. Okay. Yes, because Yeah, we know that that is a goal that does say there's different verses like be perfect as I am perfect or Right, so yeah, okay, so I think I hear you saying that at least in Catholicism There's this idea that as you take The body and blood it is becoming part of you and then you're shedding more of your human nature Am I saying that right Yeah, and I think that's the goal of all the sacraments right like that's the goal of all grace But the eucharist is the source of summit of the Christian life So in a special way it happens there. What do you think about this note? I wrote I don't I barely I mean I wrote this in January Now we're recording in March wine burns when you drink it. It feels different than juice What do you think about that is it it looks like I'm trying to get at something about it having like a cleaning aspect to it I haven't read the book You did but it wouldn't surprise me a bit of heat talk

9:25So about that concept and it's a very valid concept and even if it's just like well, you know and Communion wine is hardly going to burn. It's not like you're taking a shot of you know 120 proof whiskey or something like that, but it Never the less the concept is there the matter is there Okay, I see my next question and it's a good question I am worried it might take us further than we have time for so I'm gonna ask it and if you want to save it for next time That's totally fine We could stop it right here with the juice talk or we can talk about demons and AI are you ready? Yeah, ask it let's see Ben do you think that demons now? This is not an idea that's original to me other people are worried about this Do you think demons can speak through AI chats? Yes Yeah, like some people are thinking it can be used as a tool like a tool to trick us

10:25Like tell me tell me more about why you think you're you were quick with that. Yeah, so why do you feel that strongly? Um So I want to be very careful here. I'm not saying that every AI chat interaction is is demonic um, you know, but so it's like hey co-pilot What formula should I use you know to make things add off in my excel spreadsheet? It's like in Satan's factors like oh come on. I got so many better things to do than that That's not what I'm saying But I am saying that uh if you think of all the ways that you can use an AI chatbot many of them do start to Not I shouldn't say many some of them do start to resemble Something closer and more akin to the way a week aboard would be used meaning that there is a desire to Commune and I'm using that word quite intentionally with non-human

11:28non-corporeal consciousness I think that's a very dangerous road. I think that just like with a a Ouija board um Most times that people have used a Ouija board It's just a dumb party game But I also believe that um It's things like a Ouija board and other called activities that are done whether with a a true intention or even just a playful intention of contacting a a non-corporeal entity um Open the door to the demonic And I see absolutely no reason why that wouldn't extend to AI and to AI chatbots I'm not saying that every use of chat GPT or whatever is is demonic But I certainly see the potential there when you read some of the horror stories that have come out Of people's interactions with AI. It's hard not to see the influence of the demonic

12:30Present in them. Yeah, so absolutely. Well, maybe think of it is you're hearing more and more stories of people Instead of going to a human counselor. They're using chat GPT or something like that for counseling and I was just thinking I mean If like like some people believe that demons can speak through It's almost feels silly to say although Because I only exactly think I understand the mechanics of how that would work But just moving on from that. What are the mechanics of how it would work with a Ouija board? Yeah, I guess I don't know about that because there's so much that we don't know about the spiritual realm Yeah, I guess I just I don't know but I guess the counseling that can be scary depending on who is the source like who are you getting help from Yeah, I mean So in terms of the mechanics of it, I think it's very simple that the that the spiritual can interact with the physical Like that's just I think a concept that we believe is part of what Christian theology teaches about angels and demons You know, we could we probably don't know enough to say exactly how that works, but yet the principles there

13:35um But yeah, I think that regardless of whether or not a demon is present or not, I think opening yourself up to Do not treat an AI like a person and that includes using it for counseling that does a A very dangerous road for many many reasons number one would be that you know as we just said okay I think it opens up to the demon I say you don't well, what are the other reasons number two is dehumanizing It's inherently dehumanizing in that it um It starts to impute human qualities onto things that are not human and number three the source of your counseling um is quite important You shouldn't just oh, you know if you're looking for a actual house or actual therapist you shouldn't just know randomly Look for the first one in the phone book that you find. I don't know. Nobody uses phone books But people understand the metaphor I you should actually give care to that make sure that this is somebody who is aligning with your values and is interested in the things you want

14:35uh You don't know the source of this and so you've opened yourself up to a bunch of stuff Um that you shouldn't open yourself up to and I think that there's just a a deep care that needs to be taken with the human person And one of the concerns that I have with AI and AI being used in those cases is that it's not um, it is the A shucking off of the duty that we have to ourselves as humans So I think that is regardless of the presence of the demonic Uh tremendously horrible thing to do. Please don't do it. All right listeners. That's all from here. I'm mad Anderson I'm Ben D. Lono where the suffocations side enough Goodbye, everyone