How can tech help the Church respond to a crisis of emotional pain?

More and more, Christian leaders are trying to address the crisis of mental health by using the power of digital technology. Restoring Hope ministry director Rebecca Taguma offers some reflections from our healing and resilience team about the potential and perils of tech-based ministry to people who are suffering.

People are experiencing increasing trauma and emotional pain worldwide, and the United States is no exception. Our young people are especially hard hit by depression and anxiety. As the gravity of the crisis of mental health becomes clearer, there’s widespread consensus across American culture that we need to take action to protect people’s mental health—including in the Church.

While U.S. Christians have historically seen faith and mental health as separate spheres, there’s a growing realization that emotional pain is not only a psychological problem but a spiritual one—and that religious practice itself can be a solution. Research now shows that there’s apowerful positive link between faith and emotional wellbeing. But how can the Church best support those who are hurting in our communities? Now that there’s a smartphone in almost every pocket, many ministry leaders are looking to technology to solve the problem.

The landscape of Christian apps for emotional wellbeing

Smartphones have made Christian resources for emotional wellbeing dramatically more available to more people in more places, globally and here in the U.S. That’s been our experience with the THI mobile app, which has allowed us to make Bible-based trauma healing groups available to vastly more people around the world than ever before. 

Other Christian mental-health apps have proliferated as well, particularly since the pandemic. A quick search in your app store will show you “biblically and clinically based” mental health support from Refocus Now, biblical sleep meditations from Abide, “Scripture-based approaches to anxiety” on Glorify, Sabbath Space to manage Sunday screen time, and of course the celebrity-backed Christian everything app Hallow.

These apps, like our own, have the advantages of availability and convenience, near-limitless reach, and low to no cost for the people who use them. They also let us collect data to improve our offerings. But not every app for emotional wellbeing can be trusted merely because it calls itself Christian. 

After all, apps aren’t regulated the way mental healthcare is, so they might well be ineffective or even harmful to users’ minds and hearts. Their developers can’t always be counted on to protect users’ privacy, either. And like most tech products, they tend to reflect the context and preferences of well-paid technologists in the United States, which means they often work poorly for people with fewer resources, less bandwidth, and different cultural contexts. 

The dark side of mental-health tech

The most important downside of using apps to support mental health isn’t specific to Christian approaches: Digital technology seems to endanger people’s emotional wellbeing by its very nature. 

Take the problem of loneliness. Research shows that more Americans feel lonely than ever before. In 2025, the American Psychological Association found that more than half of U.S. adults say they feel “isolated from others.” And researchers from Harvard found in 2025 that almost one in three Americans blames technology itself for that loneliness.

The social component of tech is particularly harmful, especially for young people. According to the U.S. Surgeon General, four in ten children from eight to 12 are on social media; among kids from 13 to 17, it’s 95%. That’s a problem: it’s well established that social media, especially when consumed passively, is linked to anxiety, depression, and poor self-image in youth. So when Christian apps like Glorify and Hallow invite users to “find community” on their platforms, they risk creating more emotional problems than they solve—especially for vulnerable young people. 

Since 2023, generative artificial intelligence has introduced even graver challenges for digital mental health. Because large language models simulate human language and interactions with uncanny accuracy, they give users the feeling of connection without actual human contact. The results can be catastrophic. Without heart, soul, or conscience, chatbots have already led God’s children to delusional beliefs, even to murder and suicide.

Today’s AI technology is perilous for our souls. As Rolling Stone reports, “People Are Losing Loved Ones to AI-Fueled Spiritual Fantasies.” For that reason alone, we should be skeptical about apps that purport to use large language models to provide spiritual support. Consider ​how this AI-based Christian mental health app presents itself to believers who are hurting: “Eirene is available any time to provide immediate spiritual and emotional support … to provide meaningful, tailored interactions anchored to scriptural accuracy.” 

Because “Eirene” is a language model, not a person made in God’s image, it can actually do none of these things. But a Christian whose heart is heavy, desperate for “emotional and spiritual support … anchored to scriptural accuracy,” might find the offer too tempting to refuse. 

One way forward

Restoring Hope, the ministry I lead at ABS, creates Bible-based resources that equip the Church to support just such people—human beings struggling with difficult emotions, from shattering trauma to everyday stress. These people are longing for human connection and spiritual comfort, and the Church has an obligation to help. And technology can help—if we use it faithfully and intentionally. 

Knowing what we do about the power and danger of digital technology, my team and I have found our way to a solution that works for us and for the Church leaders we serve. The THI Mobile app is different from others I’ve mentioned in one important way: By design, it is nothing more than a new way to deliver a time-tested healing curriculum. It exists only to help Church leaders bring hurting people together, in their own communities, to find healing in the wisdom of God’s word. The app itself is so unimportant, people in app-based healing groups don’t even need to install it: the facilitator simply uses it to play audio lessons for the group to hear. The technology isn’t the point. 

While the technological revolution around us has not changed our approach to Bible-based healing, it has profoundly changed how people experience themselves, their communities, and their faith. That’s why we pay close attention to the ways technology can and can’t help the Church minister to people who are hurting.