The Chapel of St. Peter in Lucerne has replaced the priest’s confessional with a digital avatar of Jesus. This installation, titled Deus in Machina, is part of a scientific initiative from a research lab at a local university that explores immersive reality.
This small church has long been considered Lucerne’s oldest. After the AI Jesus avatar was added to the confessional, the chapel suddenly seemed unusually open to innovation. But the move also drew criticism.
What Else Is Known About the New Experience at St. Peter’s Chapel
“This was a genuine experiment. We wanted to see and understand how people react to an AI Jesus. What do they talk about with him? And will they find it interesting to engage in conversation? We are probably pioneers in this,” said the church’s theologian, Marco Schmid.
After a series of experiments with virtual and augmented reality, the research team reached an agreement with St. Peter’s Church that the next step would be to implement such an avatar in its confessional. Marco Schmid noted, “We discussed whose avatar it would be – a theologian, a person, or a saint? But then we realized that the best figure would be Jesus himself.”
As a result, the church installed an AI-powered computer program in its confessional. After training the program on theological texts, visitors were invited to ask questions of the digital image of Jesus, which was projected through a mesh screen. He responded in real time, using answers generated by artificial intelligence.
People were advised not to disclose any personal information during the interaction. Over the two-month experiment, more than 1,000 individuals, including Muslims and tourists from countries as distant as China and Vietnam, took the opportunity to converse with the AI Jesus avatar.
Data on the experiment’s results will be presented to the scientific community soon. Based on feedback from 230 users, two-thirds described the encounter as a “spiritual experience,” Schmid reported. But there were also negative responses. Some participants found it challenging to converse with a machine. One local reporter, who also engaged with the AI avatar, described its responses as rather mundane.
Schmid said the experiment drew criticism from parts of the church community. Some Catholic clergy protested using the confessional for this purpose, and some Protestant clergy objected to the depiction of Jesus in the installation. Ultimately, the creators decided the AI avatar should remain an experiment, The Guardian reported.
They emphasized the concept’s positive potential. “It’s truly a simple, accessible tool for discussing religion, Christianity, and faith,” Marco Schmid remarked.
