Now we come to religious exemptions for vaccines. In some cases its deception but, in many cases, its a lack of education. As a well-known news anchor once said, thats kind of a big deal. You dont want to do that. U.S.A. grants Religious Exemptions to not to take Vaccines. by John Brummett | September 15, 2021 at 3:17 a.m. The reasons? 6:19-20 is talking about the Corinthians collectively as the temple. Those cited here are largely specious; arguments in search of proof-texts. I agree. A relevant ethical question, drawn from scriptural teaching of the value of our bodies and treating them rightly, is whether vaccines harm the body. 29 times more likely to be hospitalized. I think it is 44% of white evangelicals have stated that they will not get thevaccine. As just a preliminary step to justify this argument one would have to establish a basis for the division of clean and unclean foods, and I wish you luck as you survey the literature on that topic! "For me . Such a claim might be motivated by the belief that their constitutionally protected rights are being infringed upon and that their religious sentiments are sufficient grounds for refusal. What have your pastors said? The Court had, in effect, ruled that if a government made any exception to a rule like allowing people to grocery shop in a pandemic it had to make an exception for religious activities. In the Bible, those who practice sorcery were those who practiced making or taking mind-altering drugs in order to stimulate hallucinations or visions! This kind of bible interpretation can justify anything, and itsdangerous. Some of those battles are important and worth fighting. (USNews https://www.usnews.com/news/health-news/articles/2021-08-10/white-evang). Lets start with the basics. If so, then other Christians can rightfully disagree and dismiss her reasoning as fallacious. There is a scriptural case to be made for not taking this vaccine. Student Religious Exemption Request; Student Remote Learning Exemption Request; Click Download to obtain a copy of the desired form. Whenever he gets a cold, even just a minor cold, it just lingers in his chest, and he has a really hard time.. If anything, the primary message from religions in America is that you have a moral obligation to take the vaccine through the idea of love of neighbor. . Do mandatory vaccinations violate human rights? "I'm very troubled by religious exemptions," Rabbi Joseph Potasnik, executive vice president of the New York Board of Rabbis. On a Friday evening in April, the Supreme Court quietly issued a short decision that opened the floodgates for religious entities to claim an exemption from just about any law. I would never sign off on someones religiousconvictions. 2 Retrieved from http://ladoj.ag.state.la.us/Article/10941. Couple that with the massive disinformation peddled at their reading level and I can understand why manyrefuse. American Baptist Churches USA (ABCUSA) is proud to be a founding member of the national volunteer COVID-19 Community Corps, which encourages people to get a COVID-19 vaccination as soon as it is available to them. Many Christians are considering the ethics and wisdom of these situations for the first time, fielding advice and anecdotes from a variety of sources. People with religious exemptions are not just looking for excuses, people get these exemptions because . She just cant pull the God told me card or defend her position by twisting Scripture. Photo by Jay Yoo, Copyright 2023 NBCUniversal Media, LLC. Philippians 4:7 - And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus. Theres a difference between an employee who says, Im unable to work Sundays because its my day of worship, and another who says, I object to working Sundays because I have a religious belief that what I do with my weekends is a matter of personal choice.. The idea that she apparently didnt consult her faith community about the veracity of her religious objection is completely off base. If claims like the latter were adequate for religious exemptions, people could excuse themselves from nearly any rulesomething no one thinks is sustainable. He will END this Vaccine Madness. While Im sympathetic to this view, it doesnt provide the basis for a religious exemption. All rights reserved, San Diego and California's COVID-19 Emergency Declarations Expire Tuesday. It also provides a sample religious exemption letter on its website. A religious exemption played a critical role. Requests for religious exemptions from workplace policies were . Some vaccines were developed using fetal cell lines from aborted fetuses, she wrote, citing a remote connection to a practice she finds abhorrent. It is a challenge that a lot of pharma companies are having to deal with. Sioux Falls, S.D., Aug 11, 2021 / 17:00 pm. These are what defile a person. (Matthew 15:11, 19-20). It's a much more complicated and complex phase and debate over religious exemptions. If you are a cancer patient, sometimes you are not to receive vaccines people who are allergic to any component of the vaccine, Tseng said. Ill provide one over-arching principle, then briefly discuss some common religious justifications we see offeredup. The vaccine effort has been plagued by falsehoods of all kinds. This is associated with what God calls sorcery and divination. I think the comment here is innocent and innocuous. The Bible calls the human body "a temple of the Holy Spirit." The New Testament makes multiple references likening the human body to a temple. Are you sure you are not violating the 3rd commandment in using God as your justification for condemning someone elsesconscience? Get daily news, in-depth reporting and critical analysis from the journalists, activists and thinkers who are working to improve our world.. It is worth considering the implications of Pauls words if they did mean what those seeking exemptions from the COVID-19 vaccine take them to mean. Christians dont receive exemptions just because they cite Bible verses for moral values everyone embraces, like a commitment to avoid harming ones body. Sure he learned about religious practices and, because border was not clear for Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits, who forgives all your iniquity, who heals all your diseases, who redeems your life from the pit, who crowns you with steadfast love and mercy, who satisfies you with good so that your youth is renewed like the eagle's. . With these goals in mind, in . Tandon v. Newsom didnt center on a traditionally hot-button issue like abortion or LGBTQ rights; it focused on COVID-19. For you were bought with a price; therefore glorify God in your body. (1 Corinthians6:19-20) Here, Paul is repeating a refrain from earlier in this same letter: Do you not know that you are Gods temple and that Gods Spirit dwells in you? (3:16). While 1 Cor 3 is the church corporately, 1 Cor 6 is quite clear the individuals body. What is said in 1 Corinthians 3:16 of the saints in general, is here said of their bodies in particular. But others will not, and their prudential judgement still follows the religious teaching of the Catholic Faith. Lets begin with Pauls first letter to the Corinthians itself. I can't even think about it.". Paul is repeating a central theme of the New Testament, which is that the purity laws found in the Torah no longer hold for those who are in Christ, because he has fulfilled them (Matthew 5:17). I know there are legitimate concerns, but there is plenty of information to address those concerns, if people understood how to navigatethat.. A New Mexico state senator will "help you articulate a religious exemption" by pointing to the decades-old use of aborted fetal cells in the development of some vaccines. The problem is that the same people who eagerly promote anti-vaccine misinformation are just as eager to misuse religion to avoid . I would gather that most Christians have no clue about these and/or what they are taking. This is perhaps the strongest religious exemption of the lot. 6:19. I still can't bring myself to think that there is a religious reason you wouldn't get vaccinated or even consider the possibility of getting vaccinated," Kirschner said. Yes, some Catholics might believe the COVID-19 pandemic evil enough and the participation remote enough to justify the shot. The first reason cites a Bible verse that says the human body is a temple of the Holy Spirit. The letter states, We are commanded to take good care of it, not to defile it, and certainly not introduce something into it. It goes on to say that taking this vaccine actually makes modifications to the body. This, in essence, would be trying to improve or alter what God made perfectly which is clearly a sinful practice., The most common argument against being vaccinated against the coronavirus is that aborted fetal cell lines were used in the production process. Philosophical exemptions: Also called personal-belief exemptions Religious exemptions: Based on the tenets of an organized religion that prohibits vaccinating its members Before You Decide to Homeschool Your Gifted Child Religious Exemptions Each of you should give what you have decided in your heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver." 2 Corinthians 9:6-7. Furthermore, it is central to the Christian faith that we may well be called to sacrifice our bodies for the sake of others (see John 15:13; Philippians 2:3-4; 1 John 3:16). There is nothing distinctly religious about the fear of bodily harm involved in vaccine hesitancy. There are legitimate religious exemptions. Its a shortsighted strategy that will end up fueling government overreach, not curtailing it. this is just stupid FoxNews stuff where they call anyone who enters who is not a citizen an illegalimmigrant. "The flu would most likely require hospitalization and COVID. Matthew 22:36-40ESV / 673 helpful votes HelpfulNot Helpful Articles on religious exemptions. Commentators cited Murdoch's deposition as evidence that the network couldn't be trusted to report the facts. Sin is lawlessness (1 Jn 3:4); doing what Gods Word forbids. Various religious doctrines direct people to take care of their bodies. But if youre a federal employee, if youre a marshal, a Border Patrol agent, wherever you work, you have to get it. This makes policing religious exemptions to vaccination hard - and rightly so. And why should they do this? A faith community might help someone discover them or learn to think about them, but the individual is the one who matters. Paul warns the Corinthians not to deceive themselves, but to have true wisdom (1 Corinthians3:18). We plead on Christ's behalf, 'Be reconciled to God'" (2 Cor. The religious exemption from vaccine mandates for . More importantly, stop blaming God for your moronicdecisions. The Awaken Church, which has several locations around San Diego County, is offering religious exemptions to its members, however. Why not? I have family members in that camp. I made the comment, I think, but I probably should have checked itfirst. James describes such wisdom as first pure, then peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, without a trace of partiality or hypocrisy (James 3:17). Second, the sample letter mistakenly interprets the temple motif to refer to physical pollution to ones body, when Paul is in fact interjecting a rhetorical question (an accusation, really) about sins that may destroy their community (the temple), among which Christresides. And this leads him to ask: Do you not know that you are Gods temple and that Gods Spirit dwells in you? A group called One Washington is holding seminars around the state to instruct people on how to ask for a religious exemption from the COVID-19 vaccine. A service of Logos Bible Software. A religious owner of a massive corporation could refuse to hire women to positions of authority over men because a workplace anti-discrimination law has an exemption for small businesses. 8:8 that "food does not bring us nearer to God.". Options for the sacrilegious. The government policing people's religion raises a number of thorny issues. What should Christians think about them? Bible verses about anxiety and fear 1 Peter 5:7 (NIV) Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you. The Bible teaches us that the body is created in the image of God 1 4 , the temple of the Holy Spirit 1 5 , a living sacrifice to the Lord. If I were to go against the moving of the Holy Spirit, I would be sinning and jeopardizing my relationship with God and violating my conscience.[4]. Many are not, and every ridiculous fight over an spurious religious objection does more harm to religious liberty than many measures fromsecularists. Logically, a Christian does not have solid ground upon which to stand to claim the non-J&J vaccines are tied to an immoral abortion. In most cases, meds are not new to the user as the vaccines are. Such statements have no place in the edifying speech that God requires ofus. The entire family is now vaccinated against the coronavirus, but they worry that Jonah wont be fully protected until everyone around him gets vaccinated as well. You are right that in 1 Cor. Many Christians are justifiably concerned about government overreach. With this article, I will try to write a template for a Religious Exemption Letter, hoping it could be useful. We would like to bring to the readers attention our perspective and experience on these important issues as they navigate these difficult questions. Platt said that the report, co-authored with Katherine Franke and Lilia Hadjiivanova, is intended to help activists, policymakers and the public prepare for the implications of the new legal regime ushered in by the Tandon case. Your statement that they are not well-understood makes me even more suspicious than I would be of drugs that have only a physical rather than mentaleffect. Moderna, Pfizer/BioNTech, Novavax - HEK293 cells are not used in production of the vaccine. Since then, the Christian right has been trying to do away with Smith in order to win ever-broader exemptions from laws that apply to everyone else. It means that a simple data point was overlooked, surely not intentionally, but even unintentionally it left an impression that isnt true. Nonetheless, the question I would like to consider is whether a vaccine could, in theory, go against Pauls exhortation in this passage. What matters for such a request is whether a worker's belief is religious, not whether it deviates from their church's doctrine or makes logical sense to their employer, attorneys said. Its in thebible! Because their body is a temple of the Holy Spirit (6:19). This is a well-meaning but sad argument. Supposedly thats actually a known side effect but who knows. I care deeply about religious liberty. Nor the Bill of Rights. That means they mix and prepare a drug at the pharmacy. 5:18, 20). Ashli Arbo has been practicing law since 2007 and is a graduate of Union University and Liberty University School of Law. Some Christians claim the various COVID vaccines have a connection to abortion. 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