Artificial intelligence
I subscribe to the TryTank newsletter where we initially found the Web3 Abbey experiment and thereby came into partnership with the The Episcopal Diocese of Texas.
In this weeks issue there was a piece featuring C.A.T.H.Y a new AI bot who has a specific focus on Episcopal sources.
What is AskCathy?
Cathy (Churchy Answers That Help You) is a virtual guide designed to engage with users through text messages. She combines an advanced AI system called ChatGPT with a wealth of resources about The Episcopal Church. Cathy’s mission is to provide information, answer questions, and facilitate conversations with anyone interested in learning more about The Episcopal Church, whether they are seekers, committed Episcopalians, or somewhere in between.
What information does Cathy have?
Cathy draws from three main sources:
- The Episcopal Church’s website: Over 1,000 pages of rich articles and documents.
- The Book of Common Prayer and Forward Movement: Cathy has access to the Book of Common Prayer and around 20 Forward Movement publications, used with permission.
- ChatGPT’s built-in knowledge base: The foundational knowledge used to train ChatGPT.
I have greatly enjoyed my first conversation with Cathy today - she answered theological, practical and liturgical curly questions with answers I felt appropriate and well measured.
As with all technology and new tools - we humans can use them well to build one another up as well as abuse them to our detriment. I am very glad to see some positive AI movements in the online space which can counter all the negatives that we are hearing about in the news and media.
We already make use of the Artistic AI Padlet in our Digital Faith Artists | Ministries and I wonder how we can engage with Cathy and others like her in the future to build one another up in the online space?
You can visit AskCathy to explore the capabilities and learn more about the Episcopal Church, in light of our ministry partnership, too.