Theology and imagination can be a winning team. A lecture for a doctorate program in theology inspired me to write a science fiction horror story. My professor was talking about how the Church was constantly behind in her thinking. As an example, he discussed how artificial intelligence was becoming more advanced and more like humans and invited us to consider what happen if we couldn’t tell the difference between humans and androids.
This led me to think about what would happen if a church made an android their pastor. I ended up writing a short novel titled The Programmed Pastor. A church board votes in favor of making An Actually Authentic Android the new pastor of their church. This android who is called Pastor Matthew Love looks so human that no one can tell that he isn’t. But can an android function as a pastor? Can an android be a model of morality?
When I sent out The Programmed Pastor to Wipf & Stock in hopes of getting it published, I was pleasantly surprised when they wanted to publish it under their resource imprint. Accepting their offer, I did the tedious work of reading over my book and taking care of any errs. The Programmed Pastor became available for purchase in the November of 2024. I have considered writing a sequel to it and I may sometime in the future.
