The Arcipresthood of Braga gathered last Saturday about 180 catechists from 50 parishes in the region at the VITA Auditorium, in a formative encounter dedicated to the challenges of artificial intelligence in Christian education. The event, which marked the beginning of the catechetical year, took place under the theme "Between Faces and Algorithms: The Catechist in the AI Era", proposing a reflection on the growing digital mediation in human relationships.
Father Marcelino Paulo Ferreira, coordinator of the "Faith Laboratory" project, gave the opening conference on new languages and technological resources, basing his intervention on the encyclical "Magnificent Humanity", by Pope Leo XIV. The priest challenged the assembly on the need to "ensure that the personal encounter with Jesus Christ is always the goal, so that catechesis does not become a mere spectacle, without biblical and ecclesial substance".
During the session, participants digitally submitted responses that generated a real-time word cloud, in which educators highlighted fears such as truth, isolation, loneliness, dispersion, and dehumanization. Father Marcelino identified "fragmented attention, hyperconnected loneliness, and the temptation of spectacle" as the main adversities accentuated by the current technological culture.
The coordinator of the Catechesis team of the Arcipresthood of Braga, Sílvia Silva, considered that the choice of this theme responds to a concrete need of Christian educators. According to her, artificial intelligence is part of daily life and should be consciously integrated into Christian life.
