# Evaluating Artificial Intelligence Through a Christian Understanding of Human Flourishing

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2604.03356 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2604.03356/

## Key facts

- Cited by 1 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Builds on 4 of its 26 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 3 Apr 2026.

## Builds on (most cited first, 4 of 4)

- [Training a Helpful and Harmless Assistant with Reinforcement Learning from Human Feedback](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2204.05862/) (2022)
- [A Survey on LLM-as-a-Judge](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2411.15594/) (2024)
- [A General Language Assistant as a Laboratory for Alignment](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2112.00861/) (2021)
- [Eight Things to Know about Large Language Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2304.00612/) (2023)

## Built on by (most cited first, 1 of 1)

- [When AI Is Your Pastor: A Benchmark for Theological Triage and Pastoral Guidance in Large Language Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2608.12324/) (2026)

## Abstract (arXiv)

Artificial intelligence (AI) alignment is fundamentally a formation problem, not only a safety problem. As Large Language Models (LLMs) increasingly mediate moral deliberation and spiritual inquiry, they do more than provide information; they function as instruments of digital catechesis, actively shaping and ordering human understanding, decision-making, and moral reflection. To make this formative influence visible and measurable, we introduce the Flourishing AI Benchmark: Christian Single-Turn (FAI-C-ST), a framework designed to evaluate Frontier Model responses against a Christian understanding of human flourishing across seven dimensions. By comparing 20 Frontier Models against both pluralistic and Christian-specific criteria, we show that current AI systems are not worldview-neutral. Instead, they default to a Procedural Secularism that lacks the grounding necessary to sustain theological coherence, resulting in a systematic performance decline of approximately 17 points across all dimensions of flourishing. Most critically, there is a 31-point decline in the Faith and Spirituality dimension. These findings suggest that the performance gap in values alignment is not a technical limitation, but arises from training objectives that prioritize broad acceptability and safety over deep, internally coherent moral or theological reasoning.