There are many reasons why Christians should avoid the COVID vaccines currently on the market. But considering those in positions of leadership and influence within the Church are openly advocating for Catholics to get the injection, it is necessary to drill down to show why they are wrong.
Most of the debate, such as statements from the Vatican, including the December 2020 document from the Congregation for the Doctrine of Faith (CDF), and the Pontifical Academy for Life (PAL) have focused on whether receiving the RNA injections (remember, they are not actually vaccines) constitute permissible material cooperation with the evil practice of using aborted baby cell lines in the production and testing process.
Others in the last few months have made numerous compelling arguments that in fact receiving these injections is immoral, imprudent, and constitutes illicit material cooperation with evil.
But, as I argued in PART 1 of this series on Legalism, it becomes easy to get bogged down in the weeds with arguing over proximate or remote cooperation with evil and whether COVID is a serious enough virus to justify receiving the injection.
I contend that a major overlooked problem with the Church’s hierarchy defending and promoting the abortion tainted RNA injections—even beyond the numerous, persuasive and independently sufficient reasons not related to abortion—is that it causes great public scandal and consequently irreparably harms the pro-life movement’s efforts to end the legalized killing of unborn babies.
Defining and Understanding the Seriousness of Scandal
In order to see why receiving the RNA injection causes scandal, it is important to first understand what scandal is. The word scandal is derived from the Greek skandalon, which means a trap or snare laid for an enemy. Prummer defines scandal:
“Scandal is some word or deed (whether of ommission or commission) that is itself evil or has the appearance of evil and provides an occasion of sin to another (emphasis added).” (Dominic Prummer, Handbook of Moral Theology, para. 230)
St. Thomas Aquinas discusses the sin of scandal and explains that:
“Now nothing by its very nature disposes a man to spiritual downfall, except that which has some lack of rectitude, since what is perfectly right, secures man against a fall, instead of conducing to his downfall. Scandal is, therefore, fittingly defined as “something less rightly done or said, that occasions another’s spiritual downfall.” Summa Theologiæ, II of II, Q. 43, Art. 1.
Thankfully, Aquinas goes into more detail, especially as to the nature of scandalous actions that leads another to sin. What does he mean when he refers to “something less rightly done or said?” Aquinas says:
“A thing is said to be less right, not because something else surpasses it in rectitude, but because it has some lack of rectitude, either through being evil in itself, such as sin, or through having an appearance of evil. Thus, for instance, if a man were to “sit at meat in the idol’s temple” (1 Corinthians 8:10), though this is not sinful in itself, provided it be done with no evil intention, yet, since it has a certain appearance of evil, and a semblance of worshipping the idol, it might occasion another man’s spiritual downfall. Hence the Apostle says (1 Thessalonians 5:22): ‘From all appearance of evil refrain yourselves.’ Scandal is therefore fittingly described as something done ‘less rightly,’ so as to comprise both whatever is sinful in itself, and all that has an appearance of evil.” (emphasis added). Summa Theologiæ, II of II, Q. 43, Art. 1.
Notice here that Aquinas refers to St. Paul’s First Letter to the Corinthians as an example in Holy Scripture condemning scandal. It’s worth looking at this passage closer:
“For if one sees you, a man of knowledge, at table in an idol’s temple, might he not be encouraged, if his conscience is weak, to eat food offered to idols? And so by your knowledge this weak man is destroyed, the brother for you whom Christ died. Thus, sinning against your brethren and wounding their conscience when it is weak, you sin against Christ.” (1 Corinthians 8: 10-12)(Revised Standard Version).
But, how serious is scandal? Pope St. Pius X tells us:
“Scandal is a grave sin because, by causing the loss of souls, it tends to destroy the greatest work of God, namely, the redemption; it effects the death of another’s soul by depriving it of the life of grace, which is more precious than the life of the body; and it the source of a multitude of sins. Hence God threatens the severest chastisement to those who give scandal (emphasis added).” Catechism of Saint Pius X, On the Commandments of the Church, The Fifth Commandment, Q. 6.
So here is what we can say about scandal, and then we can apply that to the question of receiving the COVID injections. Scandal is simply an action or behavior that leads another into evil. The scandalous action can be evil in itself but does not have to be. Even if it has “an appearance of evil,”and leads others into sin, it is scandalous. This is why St. Paul brings up the example of eating in the idol’s temple. Even though eating itself it not sinful, and even though it is not done with the intent of worshiping false gods, when done in the idol’s temple, it can lead others who may not have as strong faith to believe it is acceptable to offer such food to the pagan gods. When scandal is committed, it leads others into spiritual death, which is worse than any physical death. The stakes could not be higher.
Unlike material cooperation with evil (discussed in more detail in PART 1), which looks into the past at the evil will of another or presupposes an evil will of a sinner before bringing that evil will to completion, scandal looks to the future and causes or leads another into sin. This is important to understand when analyzing the justifications used by the vax defenders.
Application to the Morality of COVID RNA Injections
One of the most significant (certainly not the only) problem with receiving the COVID injections available on the market is that it causes scandal. Who does it scandalize? At the end of the day, it encourages others to receive abortion-tainted vaccines and it encourages the pharmaceutical companies to continue to produce and test vaccines on aborted baby cell lines. It cheapens the evil of abortion for those who receive it and covers up the evil of abortion for those who watch pro-life Catholics encourage others to receive the injections. It supports the abortion industry in general, while cutting the pro-life movement off at the knees.
The key here is to ask yourself: what message am I sending about the practice of abortion to others if I voluntarily choose to receive the injections? If it is common knowledge that the injections were produced to some extent thanks to aborted baby cell lines, if I receive the injection, does that tell others without saying a word that using aborted babies to produce medications is acceptable? Even if not acceptable, does it tell others that the evil practice of killing unborn babies is not really THAT big of a deal?
“Stop right there, mister, I see what you are doing!” you may say. Perhaps you remind me that even though the Church condemns the use of aborted babies to develop vaccines and medications, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) explained why it was not scandalous to receive the injections. Okay, let’s go there.
Answering the USCCB’s Statement on the New Covid-19 Vaccines
Let’s analyze the text of their argument with an eye towards the scandal issue. The first major red flag appears at the bottom of the second page. It states:
“[the CDF and PAF] emphasize the positive moral obligation to do good and in so doing to distance oneself as much as possible from the immoral act of another party such as abortion in order to avoid cooperation with someone else’s evil actions and to avoid giving scandal, which could happen if one’s own actions were perceived by other people to ignore or to minimize the evil of the action. Our love of neighbor should lead us to avoid giving scandal, but we cannot omit fulfilling serious obligations such as the prevention of deadly infection and the spread of contagion among those who are vulnerable just to avoid the appearance of scandal (emphasis added).”
Let’s focus on the text in bold. Here, the USCCB admits that receiving the current COVID injections on the market is evil. They openly and fully recognize that the receipt of these injections can scandalize others.
But perhaps a bigger problem is in the next sentence, where it justifies the sin of giving scandal because we must not “omit fulfilling serious obligations such as the prevention of deadly infection.” In other words, it is okay to give scandal, if giving scandal (that is committing sin and doing bad) leads to a greater good of preventing deadly infection. Are they saying the ends justify the means?
I am going to deviate briefly from the focus on scandal because the next part is so outrageous and egregious, I cannot ignore it. The USCCB says:
“In addition, receiving the COVID-19 vaccine ought to be understood as an act of charity toward the other members of our community. In this way, being vaccinated safely against COVID-19 should be considered an act of love of our neighbor and part of our moral responsibility for the common good.”
Get that? They admit that there is an evil connection to abortion in the first part of the letter and that abortion-tainted vaccines should be avoided when possible, but then the letter says it is an ACT OF LOVE to receive the abortion-tainted vaccines?!! So, to properly love others requires you to engage in or participate at least to some degree in an evil act?! True love means committing an objectively evil act. How is this not penned by the Evil One himself?
Getting back to the issue of scandal, the USCCB admits that receipt of the abortion-tainted injections can scandalize those who receive the injections, but also scandalize others who perceive Catholics receiving the injections linked to abortion. The USCCB concedes:
“Others might be less inclined to see that action [use of aborted baby cell lines] as evil. They might interpret one’s acceptance of benefits from an evil action as an indication that one does not consider the action to be truly evil, which in turn might diminish their sense of the urgency of opposing that evil. They also might miss opportunities to do what they can to oppose it. In both cases, a certain complacency about that evil action could be the result.”
Yes! Exactly! Perhaps the USCCB actually does get it! They recognize that when Catholics voluntarily receive abortion-tainted, morally compromised RNA gene therapy injections that it sends the message to other Catholics and non-Catholics alike that it is morally acceptable to receive vaccines, injections and medications that come to market, in part, thanks to the practice of abortion. This is text-book scandal and when multiplied by millions, the issue of abortion gets drowned out in the sea of saving the planet from a disease with a 99% survival rate.
So, what is the remedy the USCCB comes up with to avoid this massive, large scale, systematic scandalization of millions around the world? Perhaps simply choose not to jeopardize your soul or others by avoiding the morally compromised injections entirely and perhaps try a morally acceptable anti-viral with a decent track record such as hydroxychloroquine or ivermectin? Nope. Their remedy is:
“we should be on guard so that the new COVID-19 vaccines do not desensitize us or weaken our determination to oppose the evil of abortion itself and the subsequent use of fetal cells in research.”
And that, my friends, is it. That’s the answer to scandalizing millions of people around the world, according to the USCCB. We should be “on guard” to not desensitize others to abortion. Do you think that cat may just be out of the bag by now? Has anyone thought about or cared about the ongoing slaughter of innocent unborn babies, a practice which raged uninterrupted throughout 2020 as the Bishops were worried about shutting down the Sacrifice of Holy Mass and keeping the faithful away from the sacraments?
What ideas have other vax defenders come up with to avoid this obvious giving and receiving of scandal, which the USCCB freely admits can happen? Well, they say you can vociferously object to the use of aborted baby cell lines used to produce the potion you are about to inject into your body and make it clear that you are not receiving the injections because you support abortion but only because you care about your community out of pure, self-giving love.
Despite the obvious hypocrisy, get up on your soapbox they tell us, and loudly proclaim before the whole world that the only reason you are receiving abortion-tainted injections is because you actually love everyone else in your community. Then you step down from the soapbox, get jabbed (preferably on video) and post on social media that you are such a good person and not actively cooperating with evil or causing scandal. OKAY?
It is Just Like Pinching the Incense
For those who may not be familiar with the plight of early Christians facing Roman persecution, this situation with being offered the choice of receiving the RNA injections is really quite similar to a choice early Christian martyrs had to make.
In short, one of the ways the Romans would ferret out secret Christians was to light a fire under a statue of a pagan god or the emperor and require someone thought to be Christian to pinch incense into the fire as a sign of devotion and worship. Because this constitutes textbook idol worship, the faithful Christians would refuse to do so and he or she would be exposed and consequently arrested, tortured and executed.
What would the USCCB advise those Christians facing down execution to do in such a situation? Would they tell them: “don’t worry, just pinch the incense as long as you don’t really mean to worship the pagan idol because it would save your life? Surely, God will understand because you are saving your own life?”
If the martyred Christians had pinched the incense, even without the intent of worshiping a false idol, what message would have been sent to the Roman authorities and all those in attendance watching? Of course, the action itself would have “told” others, or given the appearance, that the one pinching the incense rejected Christ and believed it was acceptable to worship the false gods.
Why is our situation, being forced to choose whether to receive the RNA injections developed on the backs of murdered babies, any different than pinching the incense? We were put in this place and time for a reason. God knows we have to make difficult choices in life. Perhaps He wants to give us the opportunity to do the right thing and see if we will choose it?
Conclusion
I hope this reflection on the sin of scandal and it’s application to the current evil associated with the current COVID RNA injections on the market reminds everyone of what the real issue is here. It’s not how far back in time the baby whose cells are being used was killed, it’s not whether you believe Dr. Fauci or reject COVID as a gravely serious and deadly disease. These are all relevant concerns when determining whether receipt of the injections is remote material cooperation with evil. These questions, however, do not resolve whether receipt of the injections causes scandal. It truly is a scandal in every sense of the word, and we must never forget as St. Pius X tells us that scandal will deprive us “of the life of grace, which is more precious than the life of the body.”
Stay tuned for PART 3, where I will explain the motivation, ideology and heretical underpinnings of Church leaders who insist on promoting this evil.