Vaccines have been required for public school attendance for quite some time, but parents who object on religious (or sometimes philosophical) grounds have historically been able to get exemptions in every state except Mississippi and West Virginia. In 2015, California became the first state to repeal all non-medical exemptions. Maine and New York followed. Mandatory vaccination bills have been sweeping across the nation like wildfire ever since.
Most people will easily get on board with mandatory
vaccination laws because all they know is that they don’t want their children (or
anyone else’s) contracting measles. But what else is in those bills, and what
legal precedents do they set? How does this affect Christians since it is
religious exemptions that are being revoked? It’s quite the slippery slope.
Vaccine mandates set the precedent that you do not own
your own body. Bodily autonomy is defined as the right to self governance
over one’s own body without external influence or coercion.
Rabbi Green of Westboro addresses this issue in a recent
statement. [1]
“If you find this view offensive or disturbing and would
like to continue living in blissful ignorance while the very underpinnings of
free society are under attack, then please don’t read this: Who granted the
government the authority to mandate vaccination in the first place?
What happened to bodily autonomy? Some point to the fact
that the state doesn’t coerce anyone to vaccinate, and as such, doesn’t
technically violate anyone’s autonomy. Of course, this is a specious argument.
Mandatory vaccination effectively bars a child from school. Depriving a child
of an education is coercive. Education is a right, not a privilege. For a
working single mother, homeschooling is simply not an option. For many couples
who both work, staying home to homeschool children condemns their family to
indigence. This “non-compulsory” law forces them to choose between vaccination
and poverty… The problem is that infringing in individual’s rights in the name
of public welfare is risky business. We’re treading on thin ice,
constitutionally-speaking.”
Vaccine mandates also take away parental rights.
So radical are the proponents and enforcers of mandatory
vaccination laws, that they are attempting to lower the age of consent to
receive vaccinations without parental notice.
For instance, Senate Bill 104 which is being proposed in Virginia “would add, amend, and reenact §54.1-2969 of the Virginia Code, relating to vaccinations/immunizations; minors; authority to consent. The bill would allow doctors or other medical workers to administer vaccines recommended by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control (CDC) to a minor child of any age after obtaining ‘consent’ of the minor child and making a determination that the child has the ability to understand the risks and benefits associated with vaccines at the same comprehension level as an adult.
“SB104 also legally makes a minor child an adult for the
purpose of denying the child’s parents or legal guardian access to the child’s
medical records that contain information on which vaccines the child has
received.” [2]
There have now been incidents of children receiving
vaccinations at school despite their parents written refusal. The following
incident reported by ABC occurred at a school in Florida:
“Many parents allege that they’d informed the school that
they did not want their child vaccinated, only to learn later that the school
had done so anyway.
‘I also wrote in capital letters with stars Do not give
my child a flu shot. And I signed my name at the bottom of it,” said
Krystal Simmons, according to ABC’s Florida affiliate WEAR-TV.
She said it still happened.
‘She had a welt on her arm and she told me that she got the
flu shot and she told me she told the lady no and that she wasn’t
supposed to and they gave it to her anyways,’ said Simmons.”[3]
Vaccine mandates place a politician in the sacred space
between doctor and patient.
In California, legislators have gone so far as to crack down on the number of medical exemptions that doctors can write for children who cannot safely take vaccines. Doctors face investigations into their practices and threats to their licenses for writing legitimate exemptions. The following is an excerpt from an open letter written by pediatrician Dane Fliedner regarding this legislation in California:
“There are many physicians in practice that have been afraid
to speak up for fear of retribution, of being targeted by the state, for public
censure and loss of professional respect for speaking up regarding these
laws—because that is what we often observe happening from what appears to be
vindictive agendas by those in power against anyone who dares speak up…
“Although SB277 promised it was up to the discretion of the
physician who was at risk and therefore qualified for an exemption, the fact is
that the ex post facto nature of what is being now attempted by SB276 to
prosecute physicians who were trying to consider the needs of their fragile
patients outside of the very strict and narrow CDC contraindication guidelines
has sent a chilling effect to any and all physicians in this state…
“How do we decide that this child gets [a medical exemption],
but this one does not? Do you realize how many mothers I have had in my office
in tears, angry at me because I would not write them an exemption? Do you
realize these families, by being kicked out of their previous practice, have
nowhere to go for medical care for their children?”[4]
Dane Fliedner, MD, MPH
Vaccine mandates restrict religious freedoms.
The Amish refuse vaccinations because of their religious
beliefs about medicine and the use of animal products and human fetal tissue in
manufacturing them. They are self-contained communities that run their own
schools where only their own children attend. When the bill passed in New York
to remove religious exemptions for vaccinations, their private community school
was closed down.
“NY Supreme Court Rules That The Amish Cannot Exercise
Religious Vaccine Exemption To Attend Their Own Private Amish School Of 24
Amish Children.” [5]
It should be extremely concerning to all people of faith
that this country, which was founded on religious freedom, would close down a parochial
school for its valid religious beliefs.
How far will this go? California has led the way in
mandatory vaccination programs, and it might interest you to know that
homeschoolers are the next target for their draconian laws.
“Homeschool numbers continue to surge not only in California
but throughout the nation. This is something the author of SB-277, Sen. Richard
Pan (D-Sacramento), believes is problematic and the result of soft laws: ‘We
know home-schooling is increasing across the country,’ said Sen. Pan. ‘We
haven’t passed vaccination laws across the country.”[6]
Vaccine mandates allow lawmakers to add more vaccines to
the mandatory schedule as they become available.
Colorado faced a mandatory vaccination bill in the spring of
2019. In its original form, the bill added four new vaccines to
the mandatory schedule that included annual flu and HPV. HPV is a sexually
transmitted disease, not a communicable one that can be passed amongst students
during school. The bill also stated that future vaccines recommended by ACIP
would be mandatory. Who even knows what those might be? This bill failed to
pass in 2019, but has been promised to be resurrected in 2020.
Vaccine Mandates have the potential to require the
injection of digital IDs in the near future.
ID2020 is an implantable digital ID vaccination system. (Visit ID2020.org for details.)
“Would you agree to have a microchip implanted into your
body? That’s the question that Microsoft and a group of pharmaceutical
companies are asking… In theory, the practice would have people receiving
free vaccinations through the Bill Gates foundation if they have an ID chip
implant. In turn, these implants would carry encrypted, blockchain-backed data
that allow for easy access to services you can’t normally get without an ID… It
could also help social workers and researchers keep up with who is up-to-date
on their vaccinations.” [7]
Depending on your eschatology, this may send chills up your
spine. In forfeiting the right to bodily autonomy, are we paving the way for
something foretold in the Bible?
“And he causes all, the small and the great, and the rich
and the poor, and the free men and the slaves, to be given a mark on their
right hand or on their forehead, and he provides that no one will be able to
buy or to sell, except the one who has the mark, either the name of the beast
or the number of his name.” Revelation 13:16-17
What better way to set the stage for having to take the mark
than by slipping in legislation to pave the way in the name of children’s
health.
“And no wonder, for even Satan disguises himself as an angel
of light.” 2 Corinthians 11:4
