The Handbuilt Lab · Cohort 2 · October 2026
Learn to use AI well on the work your church repeats: the weekly bulletin, the finance report, marketing and communications, and social media. Connect it to the systems your church already uses, and build real skill with these tools over six weeks.
For pastors and church staff who have been meaning to learn AI, or who already use it and want to use it well. No technical background needed.
The work
Work from my own parish: a Sunday bulletin and a church brand, each recorded start to finish, and sermon research with its sources open for you to check.
Sermon research adapted to one pastor’s method: patristic commentary, current scholarship, and textual notes, with each source cited so you can open it and read it yourself. This is the recurring workflow in practice, published each week.
Read the brief →What you leave with
A working setup, connected to your church’s information
AI tools installed on your own computer and connected to the systems where your church’s information lives, such as QuickBooks, your online giving platform, email, and cloud storage. Which connections fit depends on the tools your church uses.
A faster weekly bulletin
A bulletin workflow that starts from the readings, hymns, and announcements and ends with a print-ready booklet, with your review before anything prints.
Board meeting preparation
A repeatable way to prepare for monthly or quarterly board meetings: financial summaries, reports, and packets drafted from your church’s own records, with each figure traced to its source.
An updated brand
Build or refresh your church’s identity, then apply it to the bulletins, announcements, and social posts your office makes every week.
A finished piece means one your church can use as it stands: approved by you, in your church’s identity, with the editable source file and a print-ready export saved where the next person can find them.
One-on-one help
Each week you can book a 30-minute session with me to work on your own church’s project, so you leave with something finished. For example:
Practice and judgment
AI can sound sure of itself and still be wrong. It hallucinates facts, and its drafts often sound nothing like you. Most of our time goes to the practices that fix both: giving it your church’s own material to work from, asking it to show its sources so you catch a hallucination before anyone else does, and teaching it how you write.
We also make room for theological conversation about how Christian leaders can approach this work carefully. Four questions come up in every project:
We work through them on your actual projects, with room to discuss the wider effects of AI on people, communities, and the environment. Your answers become a short working guide to AI use that your colleagues can follow.
Learn a method. Build something useful. Examine the choices involved.
Six weeks
Teaching on Mondays, working sessions on Wednesdays, 12:00 to 1:00 p.m. Eastern / 9:00 to 10:00 a.m. Pacific. Each week you learn a method, build something useful, and examine the choices involved. The dates are fixed. The order of topics is the plan as it stands and may shift once the cohort is known.
Mon Oct 12 teaching · Wed Oct 14 working
Your setup
Install the tools on your own computer and learn the working rhythm. We start with privacy: what church information can go into these tools and what stays out. You finish one small real piece before the week is out.
Mon Oct 19 teaching · Wed Oct 21 working
Connecting your church’s context
Connect the assistant to the information that matters most for your work, such as QuickBooks, your online giving platform, email, and cloud storage. Then learn to point it at your own sources and ask it to cite them, the habit that most improves accuracy.
Mon Oct 26 teaching · Wed Oct 28 working
The weekly bulletin
Build a bulletin workflow from the readings, hymns, and announcements to a print-ready booklet, with a review step before anything prints.
Mon Nov 2 teaching · Wed Nov 4 working
Your brand
Build or refresh your church’s identity, then apply it to the bulletins, announcements, and social posts your office reaches for every week.
Mon Nov 9 teaching · Wed Nov 11 working
Board meeting preparation
Prepare for a monthly or quarterly board meeting: financial summaries and reports drafted from your church’s records, with every figure traced back to where it came from.
Mon Nov 16 teaching · Wed Nov 18 working
Running it on your own
Run your workflows on a real week, fix what strains, write them down so a colleague could follow them, and finish your working guide to AI use in your church. You leave with a plan for what to build next.
Support
Mondays · group
60 min
Teaching session. The week’s method, shown on real church work, with time for questions.
Wednesdays · group
60 min
Working session. Bring what you built, get unstuck, and watch how others solved the same problem.
Your week · private
30 min
One optional appointment with Stephen each week, up to 6 across the Lab, for focused work on your own project.
Price and enrollment
Included
Paid separately
$199 plus applicable tax
October 12 to November 18, 2026.
Mondays and Wednesdays, 12:00 to 1:00 p.m. Eastern / 9:00 to 10:00 a.m. Pacific. Scheduled in New York time; clocks change on November 1, and the sessions move with New York.
$199 plus applicable tax. Secure checkout by Stripe; no account or waitlist needed.
Try the first week.
Pay when you enroll. If the Lab is not right for you, email hello@gethandbuilt.com by 11:59 p.m. Eastern on Friday, October 16, 2026 to request a full refund. That covers both opening sessions. A church can pay and name the participant afterward by emailing hello@gethandbuilt.com.
Dates don’t fit?
Leave your email and I will tell you when the next cohort is scheduled. This does not hold a seat and nothing is charged.
Fit and FAQ
No. The Lab is built for pastors and church staff, and we start where you are. If you can write an email and open a document, you have the skills we begin with.
A computer, a reliable internet connection, and a paid subscription to Claude, the AI assistant we teach with. The exact software list and what it costs goes out before the first session, and you can email hello@gethandbuilt.com to ask about it before you enroll.
Software subscriptions and any printing are paid separately by you or your church. There are no other Handbuilt fees.
Come to the Wednesday working session, or use your private appointment that week to catch up. Ask before enrolling if you already know you will miss more than one week.
Yes. Whoever pays enters their details at checkout. Afterward, email hello@gethandbuilt.com with the participant’s name and email address, and the welcome and session details go to them.
Pay when you enroll. If the Lab is not right for you, email hello@gethandbuilt.com by 11:59 p.m. Eastern on Friday, October 16, 2026 to request a full refund. Refund requests after that date are handled under the Lab’s purchase terms.
Leave your email in the form above the FAQ and I will tell you when the next dates are set. That is not a purchase and does not hold a seat.
Email hello@gethandbuilt.com, or book a short call and we will talk through your weeks and whether the Lab fits.