Delphine Collins, a 43-year-old preschool teacher, used to go to McDonald’s for breakfast before work. She’d always order the Big Breakfast — eggs, sausage and pancakes — as the sun turned Detroit’s skyline pink. She stopped going, though, when a woman in her neighborhood was stabbed to death while working there.
Collins, who fled Liberia’s civil war years ago, turned to a spiritual chatbot for comfort. It offered a psalm and said that “the Scriptures remind us of God’s power to heal and restore.” She said it helped.
She isn’t alone. Tens of millions of people are turning to A.I.-powered religious apps that mimic conversations with clergy — or even God.
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