With the increasing number of positive cases of Covid-19 patients around the world, it is a must to have everyone vaccinated, but people have different views about the vaccine and the church is not an exemption.
Pastor Robert Jeffress, leader of the 12,000-member First Baptist Church in Dallas, Texas, says there “there is no credible religious argument against” COVID-19 vaccines as an increasing number of Americans seek religious exemptions to vaccination mandates.
“There is no credible religious argument against the vaccines,” Jeffress told The Associated Press for a report last Friday.
Jeffress said he and his staff “are neither offering nor encouraging members to seek religious exemptions from the vaccine mandates.”
Both the U.S. private and public sectors have taken steps to mandate vaccines or frequent testing amid the surge in coronavirus cases, with the caveat that some religious exemptions will be given.
The comments from Jeffress come after members of different Christian communities say that they oppose taking the coronavirus vaccine because fetal cell lines were used in COVID-19 vaccine testing, according to the news outlet. Fetal cell lines, however, are not present in the actual vaccines.
“Christians who are troubled by the use of a fetal cell line for the testing of the vaccines would also have to abstain from the use of Tylenol, Pepto Bismol, Ibuprofen, and other products that used the same cell line if they are sincere in their objection,” Jeffress argued.
Other religious organizations are also against Coronavirus vaccine that’s why An official from the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America issued a statement saying that leaders “unanimously affirmed that the Church not only permits vaccinations against diseases.”
“In addition, although some may be exempt from the vaccination for clear medical reasons, there is no exemption in the Orthodox Church for Her faithful from any vaccination for religious reasons, including the coronavirus vaccine,” the statement added.
“For this reason, letters of exemption for the vaccination against the coronavirus for religious purposes issued by priests of the Archdiocese of America have no validity, and furthermore, no clergy are to issue such religious exemption letters for any reason,” the statement said.