Chaminade University of Honolulu

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AI Cannot Replace Human Values, Panelists Advise at the 2026 Marianist Lecture

Humanity can cope with the rise of artificial intelligence technology, as it has with other technological revolutions, without losing what makes us human. But we must first fully understand what AI is and how it should be used.

That was the greatest takeaway from this semester’s Marianist Lecture, held this past Sunday at Chaminade University and featuring two experts on AI and the Catholic Church’s position on this technology. The 2026 Marianist Lecture was titled “Timely Technology, Timeless Questions: AI and the Human Person.”

Kyle Ballarta is a venture capitalist and entrepreneur who has written extensively on the intersection of faith and technology. Louis Kim is an executive, technology advisor, and theologian with the Duke Divinity School. Both were this year’s guest lecturers, drawing hundreds to the Mystical Rose Oratory for a Sunday afternoon discussion on AI and human dignity.

Ballarta and Kim had earlier spoken to students and faculty last Friday to discuss AI as part of the University’s Wellness Week enrichment event. Sunday’s Marianist Lecture involved more formal presentations followed by a brief question-and-answer session with audience members.

Back in May, His Holiness Pope Leo XIV released his landmark encyclical letter, Magnifica Humanitas. In it, Pope Leo discusses AI technology at length, rejecting arguments that it represents some new form of consciousness similar to human self-awareness while accepting that AI is a powerful tool that must be managed responsibly.

“We cannot consider AI to be morally neutral,” the Pope’s encyclical states.

Ballarta imparted the same words of wisdom during his Marianist Lecture presentation. “We choose values, and those values choose technologies,” he said.

In other words, how this technology is used depends on the values of the people both building it and applying AI. Ballarta reminded the audience that new technologies have always drawn concern throughout human history–from Gutenberg’s printing press to the telephone–yet humanity has always found a way through these changes, incorporating new groundbreaking technologies into everyday life without losing ourselves.

“This has always been about how machines impact humanity,” Ballarta said.

Kim echoed Ballarta’s reflections, acknowledging the anxiety many are feeling about AI, particularly over its potential impact on jobs and human connections.

“What is precious about being human?” he asked the audience. “When AI gets so powerful, what are we going to hold on to?”

AI technologies, in particular the most popular large language models (LLMs) or chatbots, are based on computer processing architectures that empower computers to recognize and replicate common patterns and relationships between data points. Whereas computers could once only process text word-by-word, modern LLMs can read entire paragraphs and even books and recognize how the words and phrases contained within them relate to one another, enabling these machines to generate their own human-like responses to queries.

As impressive as this technology is, we should not mistake this processing power for actual human thought or consciousness, Ballarta cautioned during his talk, echoing one of the main points delivered in Pope Leo XIV’s encyclical. “We are more than numbers and data,” he said.

Meanwhile, Kim offered words of encouragement to people feeling overwhelmed by the rapid progression of AI technology and its intrusion into our daily lives. He argued that faith very much still has a seat at the table for this broader discussion, and that the Catholic Church in particular has a role to play.

The Church “has the power of cultural change,” Kim reminded everyone.

Ballarta agreed. Catholicism “can be a serious instrument in addressing these questions,” he said.

A powerful tool to be managed

On Sunday, Bishop Michael Thomas Tupou Castori, the sixth and presiding Bishop of the Diocese of Honolulu, returned to the Chaminade campus to hear Ballarta and Kim discuss AI and the Church’s position on its rise.

Questions from the audience reflected both general confusion over what AI technology is and genuine concern about how it may negatively impact society. Audience members reminded Kim and Ballarta that the people in Silicon Valley and beyond developing AI technologies do not necessarily have the best intentions in mind.

Kim said he has encountered both good and bad actors in his interactions with Silicon Valley technology company executives. Yet he acknowledged that this concern is legitimate. He said the only response is thoughtful and appropriate regulation of AI technology.

Ballarta agreed, saying governance will matter a great deal in determining how AI technologies ultimately impact humanity. “Does the technology serve us, or are we serving the technology?” he asked, asserting that AI must, of course, serve humanity and not undermine it.

Other audience members expressed anxiety that, given enough time, generative AI technology will become so powerful that it will be difficult, if not impossible, to know when an image, video, or audio recording is real or not.

On this point, Kim offered optimism, recalling his own experiences allowing AI to generate writing on his behalf; no matter how good it is, he said, the AI cannot quite imitate his voice and writing style, suggesting that people will be able to recognize when something is off in encountering AI-generated content.

Humans are keen enough to recognize when something doesn’t quite fit the world we know.

The next Marianist Lecture will feature Msgr. John Paul Kimes and a local panel on “The Saints of Hawaiʻi” and will take place on Sunday, February 21, 2027, at 4 pm. 

Wellness Week is a Wrap!

The first-ever Wellness Week at Chaminade University ended Friday with positive reviews from the campus community and calls for another one next year.

Organized as a way to help students reduce stress and recharge halfway through the Fall Semester, Wellness Week featured dozens of campus events organized by colleges and departments.

Instructors also organized mini wellness-themed activities with their classes, taking a break from regular lectures and instruction.

Cheryl Edelson, Ph.D., co-Dean of the College of Arts & Sciences, said she heard very positive things about Wellness Week from students attending the wellness sessions. Her college organized a handful of events, including a “sound bath” in Loo Theatre, a lunch at the Conference Center featuring games and a scavenger hunt, and movie screenings.

“They appreciate the break,” Edelson said, sharing the reactions she’s been receiving from students.

“We were prepping for the midterm exam but also talking about their papers,” she added. “And so, for them, a slower pace, I think, is giving them a little bit of time to catch a breath. The idea is to basically help them kind of recharge.”

The week kicked off with guided meditation sessions at the Mystical Rose Oratory and Zuberano Lawn. Yoga lessons were on offer, along with cooking demonstrations, including lessons on making the perfect onigiri and Spam musubis hosted by Aramark Dining Services.

Carlson Fitness Center guided students on how to design suitable workouts depending on their fitness goals.

Meanwhile, the campus chapter of the Psi Chi honor society of psychology majors organized the “Plant, Paint, and Pause” event on Wednesday. The hour-long gathering was held “to support student wellness by creating an intentional moment to slow down during the semester,” Psi Chi explained.

Pizza was also offered at that special Psi Chi event.

Other Wellness Week activities were more educational in nature. “We tried to put together some arts and humanities-related and science-related activities throughout the week,” Edelson explained.

Wellness Week also saw the return of therapy dogs to Chaminade University. Organized by Campus Ministry, students were invited to the “Puppy Love” therapy dog session held over the Thursday lunch hour, an opportunity to unwind with the official therapy dogs while enjoying rock painting.

Shannon Sheehy, a junior Sports and Event Management major, said she and her friends really appreciated the week-long opportunity to unwind.

“I think it’s been very beneficial,” Sheehy said. “I play volleyball here, so I feel like for our team, it’s been nice to get out and see puppies and have time to take care of ourselves and put the students first.”

Sheehy admitted that a busy first half of the semester had her feeling a bit overwhelmed earlier, but Wellness Week was a good fix for that. “It’s been pretty stressful, but after this week, I feel that it was a good reset to have,” she said.

Mahina, a freshman nursing student, said she and her fellow students were enjoying Wellness Week but that some students suggested a simple break from classes might have been better.

“I feel like it’s going pretty well,” she said.  “But from what I’ve heard, from both my classmates and also just being around, some students preferred to just have a fall break.”

Still, Mahina said Chaminade students were happy with the schedule of activities and of the opportunity to pause mid-semester. “The events have been very well received from what I have seen,” she said. “A lot of people had fun at the events.”

Wellness Week emphasized students’ academic wellness.

Organizers hoped that the mid-semester pause would help students who may be struggling to have a chance to take a break and get the help and attention they needed. With the pause in regular course instruction, faculty members were afforded chances to reconnect with their students and lend assistance to anyone who may need additional support.

Edelson said Chaminade’s leadership plans to poll students afterwards to see what worked well, what didn’t, and how Wellness Week may be operated differently should it return in Fall 2027. She said the concept of a Wellness Week is relatively new but starting to spread rapidly at college campuses across the United States.

“It’ll be interesting to see the data at the end of it,” she said.  “This is really a time of the semester where we can help students kind of turn things around if they need to, or if they’re doing great, they can continue that way and still get a breath,” Edelson added.

Sheehy said Chaminade should definitely consider holding another Wellness Week next year.

“I think it’s very beneficial for everyone.”

Hogan Entrepreneurial Leadership Program Kicks Off 24th Year

The Hogan Entrepreneurial Leadership Program is now celebrating its 24th year mentoring students seeking independent business opportunities or leadership skills to help organizations succeed, both for-profit and nonprofit. On Wednesday evening, past and current Hogan participants, alumni, and business leaders gathered to launch another year of Hogan with an inspiring keynote address and opportunities to connect, network, share inspiring stories, and celebrate one of Chaminade’s most successful institutions.

Chaminade University President Lynn Babington, Ph.D., welcomed attendees to the celebration and thanked them for supporting the Hogan initiative over the years.

“It’s such a pleasure to be here with you this evening and again kick off the 24th year of the Hogan program,” Babington said.

“We are very proud of the Hogan program,” she said. “Linking students with community members enriches new ideas and opportunities here in Hawai‘i.”

This year’s Hogan Kick-Off Celebration, held at the Sullivan Family Library Lawn, featured music, good food, drinks, and time for attendees to mingle and socialize. The featured speaker for the evening was Melissa Crounse Kaufman, a renowned entrepreneur and Founding Executive Director of The Garage, a startup incubator at Northwestern University.

“Previous speakers have been terrific, but I think this is one of the best ones we’ve had that I can remember in my time,” said Roy Panzarella, Ph.D., Director of the Hogan Entrepreneurial Leadership Program.

Kaufman, who now lives in Maui and works as a school teacher, shared a story with the audience of how she once tested the entrepreneurial instincts of her students against artificial intelligence (AI) technology.

She split the class into two groups and asked each to develop an innovative idea for a new snack product. One group had unlimited access to AI tools; the other had to use their wits.

Upon conclusion of this exercise, the class determined that the best idea came from the “brain team” that was denied the use of any AI advantage. The winning team proposed selling hibiscus-flavored popcorn that comes in resealable bags.

Kaufman told the audience to take this lesson to heart.

“AI is a pattern matching machine,” she said. “It draws from what already exists, and it optimizes for what has worked before, in the past.

“The winning idea in my class didn’t come from a prompt. It came from a teenage girl’s lived experience.”

Kaufman said she owes her success not to building successful companies, but to building up people and helping them make personal connections they can translate into winning enterprises.

“Students cannot build judgment or persuasive speaking or interpret body language or build connections alone in their dorm rooms talking to Claude,” she stressed. “Students need to interact with real businesses and real business problems in real time.”

Panzarella said Kaufman’s message is poignant for the times as the rise of AI technology leaves everyone nervous for the future.

Kaufman pleaded with business leaders in the audience to deepen their engagement with Hogan students. The program’s long success lies not with technologies like AI, she said, but with the personal connections the program fosters.

“You have to help in this mission because we can’t do it alone,” she said. “You need to share your time, your expertise, and your network with the students by serving as a mentor or a guest speaker.”

In addition to raffle prizes, the event presented two awards recognizing present and future entrepreneurial success.

Kai Cowell was honored with the Hogan program’s “In the Arena” award for her success with Ka‘iulani Spices, a healthy foods and flavoring company selling products at major retail outlets. The $1,500 student award went to Liliyah-Joy Quel-Kaina, a Hogan junior juggling two majors and minors who recently landed a coveted internship opportunity. 

The latest Hogan kick-off celebration comes at the midpoint of the semester and also lands in the middle of Chaminade’s first Wellness Week, a series of events aimed at helping students pause and reset.

Panzarella said the timing for the 24th Hogan Kick-Off is deliberate. He finds participants are more engaged and primed for action at this point in the academic year compared to the beginning of the semester or in the summer.

“We wanted to take time to let the semester sort of breathe a little bit,” he said. “We found that people are much more amenable to celebrating, to community building.”

He said the 24th year of the Hogan program won’t be delivering any major new surprises, but the year will still feature plenty of exciting gatherings and inspiring speakers. He said the team is planning new leadership initiatives, including one that may happen at Pearl Harbor.

Much of this year will be spent planning for the Hogan Entrepreneurial Leadership Program’s 25th anniversary year, coming up in 2027. Panzarella promised great things to come as the Hogan program rings in 25 years of incubating new business ideas and preparing young entrepreneurs for success.

“25 is going to be big,” he said.

Chaminade’s First-Ever Wellness Week Begins

A full week at Chaminade University is set aside to help students rest, reflect, and recharge, priming them to finish the semester strong.

Wellness Week, which lasts through Friday, features a series of events focused on instilling better physical, mental, spiritual, and academic well-being within students. Chaminade’s leadership was inspired to organize and launch the university’s first Wellness Week to give students an opportunity to pause and consider where things stand in their lives and studies at this point in the semester.

To help students rest and rejuvenate, the university has set aside quiet spaces for silent reflection, meditation, and prayer. The Mystical Rose Oratory’s doors are open, with students invited to use the space for quiet contemplation, introspection, and seeking inner peace.

The week will feature guided meditation and yoga, along with fitness and nutrition demonstrations. Meanwhile, the Vi and Paul Loo Theatre in Clarence T.C. Ching Hall has been transformed into a “sound bath” for students to enjoy.

Each class is holding only one session this week, with faculty using the time to guide students through tailored Wellness Week activities they’ve arranged.

Chaminade University Provost and Vice President of Academic Affairs Lance Askildson, Ph.D., said he initially conceived of Wellness Week after noticing how students could begin feeling a bit overwhelmed by early October.

“The idea was to intervene intentionally before relatively manageable challenges become much harder to reverse,” he said.

Planning for Wellness Week began back in February. The Office of the Provost, Academic Affairs, Student Success, Campus Ministry, and all four Colleges collaborated on planning and preparations. The concept was accepted unanimously by both the Academic Council and Senior Leadership Council.

Askildson said Wellness Week is organized with students’ academic wellness first and foremost in mind. “The overarching goal is to give students a chance to reset and reengage.”

“The week has been intentionally designed to focus on academic support, first and foremost, and alongside broader wellness activities and opportunities for reflection,” he added. “Basically, we want to give everyone a chance to catch their breath and take stock of where they are at in the semester.”

The Mystical Rose Oratory is serving as an open meditation, reflection, and prayer space during Wellness Week.

The week’s schedule is filled with activities organized to appeal to all tastes and desires.

Wellness Week kicked off with guided meditation at the Mystical Rose Oratory and on Zuberano Lawn. Aramark Dining Services hosted a demonstration on the art of crafting the perfect onigiri, or Japanese rice balls. Not to be outshone, the Marianist Center and College of Nursing & Health Professions invited students to its “Nacho Normal Taco Tuesday” event, where participants can learn how to master dorm cooking.

The Carlson Fitness Center will show students how to design a safe and satisfying workout routine through demonstrations happening there Wednesday and Thursday mornings.

Therapy dogs are even returning to campus for Wellness Week. Students are invited to unwind with the pups and perhaps enjoy some rock painting with the Student Affairs office and Campus Ministry.

Wellness Week closes with a mid-day live concert featuring The Racket Brothers & The Rackettes. Friday also features a crochet workshop and a special discussion on the impact of artificial intelligence (AI) technologies on society, led by guest speakers Kyle Ballarta and Louis Kim.

Askildson said now is the perfect time to offer some space for students to unwind, rest, and have fun.

“We see this as a targeted and useful pause at the midpoint of the semester and an intentional time for academic and personal reflection,” he explained, adding that he hopes the very first Chaminade University Wellness Week will leave students “ready to be successful for the second half of the term.”

Wellness Week may be repeated next year, creating a new annual Chaminade tradition, based on receptions from students, faculty, and staff.

New Honolulu Bishop Gathers With Young Faithful at Chaminade

A new Bishop is in town.

Last spring, Pope Leo XIV appointed Father Michael Thomas Tupou Castori as the sixth Bishop of the Diocese of Honolulu. As a way of introduction, Bishop Castori visited Chaminade University to mentor–and and learn from–young Catholics in Hawai‘i.

Bishop Castori succeeds former Bishop Clarence Richard “Larry” Silva, who retired after more than two decades as head of the Honolulu Diocese.

Accepting an invitation to the Chaminade campus, Castori dropped by on the evening of October 3 for a “meet-n-greet” with young adults.

More than 100 participants turned out to meet the new Bishop and hear his thoughts, an impressive turnout for a Saturday night in Honolulu. Organizers said they were pleased with the interest and enthusiasm of the crowd.

During his talk, Bishop Castori shared that he almost never became the new leader of the Honolulu Diocese, which oversees church affairs throughout the state of Hawai‘i.

Castori said it seemed that a higher power had other plans.

He initially asked to be taken off the list of candidates for Bishop of Honolulu given that he recently started work at Seattle University. That request didn’t go well for him, he said.

“The way God works with me is, when I’m acting contrary to his will, I can’t sleep,” he explained.

After fussing all night, he recalled how he prayed on the matter and ultimately decided to keep his hat in the ring. Following that, he managed to get one hour of sleep, and then rescinded his request that morning.

“Once the appointment was confirmed, I felt a lot of peace and salvation and joy,” he said.

The Pope’s selection of Castori may stem from his long experience in Oceania.

Ordained in 1996, Castori ministered in Tonga, Fiji, Guam, and the Marshall Islands. His appointment as the newest Bishop of Honolulu marks his return to the Pacific region.

While at Chaminade, Bishop Castori was interviewed by the EPIC Ministry Podcast host Malcolm Zara.

In the interview, Castori confided that he originally sought to become a lawyer. That changed after he attended a retreat with his college campus ministry during his senior year. There, he had a profound and life-changing experience.

At the retreat, he recited a prayer from Psalm 131, “and I felt God was right there with me,” he recalled.

Later, he found himself alone walking down the stairs in front of a Jesuit high school in Boston wearing a long black coat when he experienced the calling again.

“Suddenly, I found myself looking around, and I felt like a priest.”

An exchange with young Catholics

Young adults from O‘ahu, Kaua‘i, Maui, and Hawai‘i Island traveled to the Chaminade campus to meet the new Bishop. After a lively exchange with Zara, the audience had a chance to pose questions to him.

Asked about the difficulties younger Church members are having breaking into leadership roles as they face resistance from older members, Castori advised patience and presence, and perhaps gentle reminders to established authorities that they were once young Catholics seeking a place in the Church hierarchy. “Don’t give up, don’t run away,” he said. “I think presence is important.”

Some in the audience asked how they should approach friends and family members who have fallen away from the Church. Castori said the best approach to take is to be a “loving presence” as “that can be the most powerful way of evangelizing.”

Keeping youth engaged in the Church may be becoming less difficult with time.

Toward the end of the evening, the discussion turned to the apparent revival of interest in Catholicism among young adults, including those who have no familial history with the Church. Taking his turn to ask questions, Bishop Castori asked the audience of young Church-goers if they could provide an explanation for this sudden surge of interest in joining the Catholic Church, particularly among young adults and younger men.

Audience members shared that it likely stems from the isolation and loneliness many felt during the COVID-19 pandemic. They also explained that there is a great dissatisfaction with modern technologies that offer poor substitutes for genuine human interaction. Another audience member said youth are increasingly seeking authenticity, and the Church provides that.

Bishop Castori praised this development but also challenged the audience members to set positive examples for new Church members and their peers to follow.

“There are unlimited opportunities every day to do the good right in our midsts,” he said.

Poet Laureate of Hawai‘i Shares Stories, Spoken Word, and Fun Life Lessons

Chaminade University freshmen need to “keep things in perspective,” according to a celebrated pidgin poet and writer.

Lee A. Tonouchi is the author of several books, including the award-winning “Significant Moments in da Life of Oriental Faddah and Son: One Hawai‘i Okinawan Journal” and “Okinawan Princess: Da Legend of Hajichi Tattoos,” a children’s book that won the Skipping Stones Honor Award. He’s also edited an anthology of Hawaiian and Okinawan literature and wrote a renowned play.

Earlier this week, Tonouchi was invited to Chaminade’s campus to deliver a special lecture, the second in the CUH 100 course series. The CUH 100 seminar, required for all freshmen, is designed as an orientation to Chaminade life and scholarship in Hawai‘i.

Tonouchi kicked things off by entertaining the crowd with a lengthy retelling of one of his short stories, delivered entirely from memory. His specialty is literature that celebrates pidgin, the unique dialect endemic to these islands.

With wit and a sharp memory, he shared the story of when he first submitted his writing to a fiction contest held by Honolulu Magazine. He was the runner up, which he thought was pretty impressive, until a famous local writer informed him that he was “never going to win” because of his emphasis on pidgin words and phrases, as he recalled.

Tonouchi would go on to win the Honolulu Magazine fiction prize in 2004. He took those top honors again in 2006.

Regarding that famous writer he met and her discouraging words, Tonouchi said she never unfazed him; rather, he came out of that exchange more determined than ever to keep pursuing his passion for pidgin and the local culture.

“Can we fault her?” he asked the students of this famous writer. “Yes, you can still fault her,” he said, saying she not only behaved rudely, but she was also at fault for restricting her own imagination of what’s possible in local Hawai‘i literature.

His determination and hard work has paid off.

This past February, the State of Hawai‘i named Tonouchi the Hawai‘i Poet Laureate after a competitive review of contestants held by the Hawaiʻi Council for the Humanities, the Hawaiʻi State Foundation on Culture and the Arts, and the Hawaiʻi State Public Library System.

He’ll carry the title of state Poet Laureate until 2029.

The honor comes with a stipend that funds his travels across Hawai‘i to share his poetry and lead writing workshops.

Tonouchi was also granted a fellowship by the Academy of American Poets.

Despite his long list of accomplishments, Tonouchi came across in his lecture as affable, funny, relaxed, and supremely confident. That energy resonated with the student audience.

“Da Pidgin Guerilla” (the nickname given to him by a former professor) spent the Wednesday lunch hour sharing stories, poems, and anecdotes from his childhood growing up in Hawai‘i to his eventual pursuit of a career as a poet, book author, and playwright.

He recalled how, as a child, he once tried looking up the pidgin word “bumbai” in the dictionary because his classmate didn’t know what it meant. Bumbai is a pidgin word that loosely translates to “later” and sometimes “or else.”

The pidgin poems and stories he shared with the Chaminade community celebrated rice, spam, relationships, and a zeal for life and art.

Noted for his activism in linguistic justice, Tonouchi shared that, growing up, it never dawned on him that he was a pidgin speaker or speaking pidgin; he was simply expressing himself, and he understood that he had the right to share this part of himself with the world, and not hide it.

“I was born pidgin, but I never know I was talking pidgin,” he said.