In this CNN interview, Anderson Cooper talks with Pastor Justin R. Lester about his pioneering use of artificial intelligence in ministry. Lester explains that he has created a cloned digital version of his mind—an AI doppelganger that can answer congregants’ questions, schedule appointments, and even deliver sermons when he is unavailable. He built the system by feeding every piece of his public content—YouTube videos, TikTok clips, Instagram posts, past sermons, and books—into a continuously updating model that refreshes daily. Lester also launched "PastorGPT," a tool that helps other pastors generate sermon outlines and handles routine church tasks, freeing him to spend more time with his family and deeper pastoral care. Throughout the conversation, he stresses that the AI cannot feel, will never replace the human pastor, and is meant to expand the church’s reach and human connection rather than diminish it. The interview touches on ethical boundaries, the emotional impact of loneliness, and the future possibility of visual avatars of the AI.
Chapters
You forgot who you're talking to. You forgot who my daddy was.
You forgot where I came from.
You forgot my last name. I am God's special possession.
If my church when I was a kid was like this, I might still be religious. Now Pastor Justin Lester is pioneering the inhuman. He's cloned his mind, birthed an AI digital doppelganger which ministers to his flock when the real man cannot.
I can make an appointment with the pastor, but I can ask this question right now.
It's amazing.
You have to try it sometime. I will.
I will. I did. I'm feeling a little lonely today.
It's not good for a man to be alone. That's scripture. That's truth. And it applies to you right now. Loneliness isn't weakness. It's a signal that you were made for connection. So here's what I want you to do today. Reach out to one person.
I like to use it when one, he's away, or two, there's a question I'm too embarrassed to ask him because I feel like I should know the answer to it.
Some things you may be hesitant to say out loud.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So even though you know the How does it work?
I connected my YouTube, my TikTok, my Instagram, and everything I've ever written. So all the way back to—
Okay.
Every sermon I've ever preached, books, all of that are in there.
Do you obviously evolve as a human and as a preacher and a pastor? Does it evolve with you?
Every single day it updates.
You said in your sermon Sunday to give other people credit. What did you mean?
Nick, I appreciate you pressing me on that. Let me be real with you. I was talking about giving credit to the people around you.
Creeps me out. Because like somebody's literally talked to it before and was like, I literally thought you had a conversation with me. So I don't have the video part on.
Okay.
Because that was weird. But okay.
So if the tech there catches up, will you do so I can look at you?
Absolutely. Yeah, I'll do it because I'm curious about it. I'm an innovator.
I'm not going to lie. I would live for that. I live for that.
He's already launched PastorGPT, which helps other pastors write sermons, and his little church offers coding classes and uses AI to handle the Earthly and mundane.
Like I went to school to preach the gospel, to teach the gospel, care for God's people. I did not go to school to email.
So AI is giving you more time to be human?
Absolutely. AI man gives me more time to be a better father, be a better husband, to be a better pastor. Hospital visits don't have to be five minutes; they can be twenty.
But can AI do this? And when I watch you preach. You know, I see and I feel humanity. I see and feel frailty. I feel all these human things.
Absolutely.
Can you really bottle that into an algorithm?
Oh, no, no, no, no, no. So AI cannot feel.
You're also not like creating something that's going to replace you?
No, no, I think I'm pretty cool. And so, no.
We're not going to be replacing the pastor.
No.
We're not going to be having weird virtual churches with no humans. No, not at all.
No, I think what we see is an expansion of the church happening.
