In a growing consensus, religious leaders at the forefront of the anti-abortion movement in the United States are telling followers that vaccines available to fight COVID-19 are acceptable, given their remote and indirect connection to derived cell lines. from aborted fetuses.
An open enemy of abortion, based in Dallas, the megachurch pastor, Southern Baptist Robert Jeffress, called the vaccines a “gift from God.”
“Asking God for help, but then refusing the vaccine, makes no more sense than calling 911 when your home is on fire, but refusing to let firefighters in,” Jeffress said in an email. “There is no legitimate reason to refuse the vaccine.”
Rev. Al Mohler, president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, also celebrated his development.
“I will take it not only for what I hope will be good for my health, but also for others,” he said on his website.
The US Catholic Bishops’ Conference, which says the fight against abortion is its “preeminent” priority, said last month that coronavirus vaccination “should be understood as an act of charity towards other members of our community,” according to a statement. by the chairs of the Committee on Doctrine and the Committee on Pro-Life Activities.
The bishops said it was morally acceptable for Catholics to use either vaccine approved for use in the United States – developed by Pfizer and Moderna – despite a “remote connection to morally compromised cell lines.” This involved the use of fetal cell lines for laboratory tests aimed at confirming the effectiveness of vaccines.
Another state-of-the-art vaccine, produced by AstraZeneca and approved for use in the UK and other countries, is “more morally compromised” and should be avoided if alternatives are available, bishops said.
Coinciding with the USCCB, four bishops from Colorado issued their own statement adopting a slightly more negative position towards AstraZeneca, describing it as “not a morally valid option”.
AstraZeneca used a cell line known as HEK293 to develop its vaccine. According to the Oxford University team that developed it, the original HEK293 cells were taken from the kidney of an aborted fetus in 1973, but the cells used now are clones of the original cells and are not the original fetal tissue.
As the first vaccines approached approval last year, some Catholic bishops warned that they could be morally unacceptable. Among them was Bishop Joseph Brennan of Fresno, California, who urged Catholics not to jump on the “vaccine wagon.”
He later changed his position, saying that because of the health risks to individuals and communities, “Catholics may decide ethically for serious reasons to use such vaccines.”
Bishop Joseph Strickland of Tyler, Texas, who also questioned the vaccines, described any use of aborted fetuses in vaccine development as bad and said he would not get any of the vaccines currently available.
“The church said that in certain circumstances, the administration of the vaccine is allowed and I do not dispute this,” he said by e-mail. “The church also said that we should vigorously call for morally produced vaccines and urge those taking the vaccine to join that mission and call for change.”
Strickland encourages donations to the John Paul II Institute for Medical Research, which supports research aimed at developing what he calls “ethical” cell lines – using adult stem cells – that would be used to make vaccines and other medical therapies.
Other anti-abortion bishops accepted the vaccines.
“Because a Christian engages the world, it is impossible in many situations to completely avoid cooperation with moral evil,” Bishop Thomas Tobin of Providence, Rhode Island, wrote on Twitter. “The church, on many levels, said it was morally acceptable to receive the vaccines currently available. I agree.”
Bishop Richard Stika of Knoxville, Tennessee, said he had no doubts about vaccination.
“I just hope they don’t implant a microchip in my arm to find out when I’m cheating on my diet,” he joked on Twitter.
Among Protestant evangelical leaders, who generally have strong views against abortion, there has been relatively little anti-vaccine rhetoric, according to Rev. Russell Moore, who leads the public policy arm of the Southern Baptist Convention.
“I wouldn’t be able to think of an evangelical pastor who says, ‘Don’t be vaccinated,'” he said.
A more notable challenge for pastors, Moore said, is to combat baseless conspiracy theories adopted by some members of their congregations or communities – for example, that vaccines would alter the recipient’s DNA or secretly implant a microchip. .
Globally, the Vatican has issued guidelines largely similar to those of U.S. bishops, saying it is morally acceptable for Catholics to receive COVID-19 vaccines based on research using cells derived from aborted fetuses.
One difference: he did not name or give details about specific vaccines. The Vatican plans to use the Pfizer vaccine starting this week for employees and their families, and Pope Francis – in an interview with an Italian radio station broadcast this weekend – said he has a meeting to be vaccinated.
The Vatican has suggested that it is wrong to refuse a vaccine based solely on the objection of abortion, because the refusal “can also lead to a risk for others.”
Nicanor Austriaco, a molecular biologist and Catholic priest who teaches at universities in the United States and the Philippines, said the Vatican has adequately addressed faith-based concerns about vaccines indirectly linked to research using aborted fetal cells.
“The moral evil contemplated here” took place in the 1970s, when the original cell line was created, Austriaco said, “and is removed.”
G. Kevin Donovan, a professor of pediatrics at Georgetown University who runs the Pellegrino Center for Clinical Bioethics, said the leaders of his Catholic faith could not have been “clearer.”
“The advantage that Catholics have is … the highest levels of authority have made it very clear that this is a morally acceptable thing to do,” Donovan said.
In Indonesia, which is home to the largest Muslim population in the world, a Muslim clerical council has been included in the process of purchasing the nation’s vaccine to ensure that a product is halal or acceptable for use in accordance with Islamic law. In the past, the council decided that some vaccines for other diseases were unacceptable because they used gelatin derived from pigs.
But on Friday, the council gave its approval to China’s Sinovac COVID-19 vaccine, paving the way for its distribution in Indonesia.
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Associated Press writers Elana Schor of Washington, Nicole Winfield of Rome and Victoria Milko of Jakarta, Indonesia, contributed to the report.
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