Vaccines and Weasel Words

I figured that I might as well blog early in the history of Catholic Pediatrician on what has become a controversial topic. Let’s start with a few questions…

Is the development of vaccines the leading cause of improved health over the past 150 years? Do vaccines do more harm than good? Do they cause autism? What about cancer? Are vaccines the reason behind massive drug company profits? These are all important questions that will not be answered in this space, at least today.

In keeping with our mission, the focus will be on the nexus between Catholicism and pediatrics.

Much of pediatric education focuses on prevention. Vaccines are a form of primary prevention of disease and touted throughout the pediatric world as a MUST. If a parent questions or refuses, or even worse “does their own research,” we get our backs against the wall. How dare you question me and all my years of training and board certification?

Well- parents have a duty to question me. According to the Catechism of the Catholic Church, parents have the “primordial and inalienable” responsibility to care for the physical, moral, and educational needs of their child. To do otherwise would be an abdication of their prime responsibility to care for the life God entrusted to them.

Putting aside the questions raised above, what about the morality of currently available vaccines? To be clear, the pediatric vaccines derived from abortions are the MMR, varicella, hepatitis A, rabies, and SARS-CoV2 vaccines. Is it moral to benefit from a product derived from an elective abortion? Can it be somehow be justified? The Catechism in paragraph 2258 states, “Human life is sacred because from its beginning it involves the creative action of God and it remains forever in a special relationship with the Creator, who is its sole end. God alone is the Lord of life from its beginning until its end: no one can under any circumstance claim for himself the right directly to destroy an innocent human being.” The Catechism seems clear, but let us take a look at what the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith has to say. The CDF talks about “licit cooperation in evil.” They further make the distinction between formal and material cooperation as well as active and passive cooperation. Remember, I am not a philosopher or theologian. As such, I say, evil is evil. These mental gymnastics are what I refer to as weasel words. They are used to justify an otherwise unjustifiable position.

The CDF went on to state that doctors and fathers had the duty to lobby for morally licit vaccines. I agree, and will add that cardinals, bishops, and priests also have the responsibility to push for ethically produced vaccines. I argue the heavy lifting on this is the responsibility of the Church hierarchy, as they stand in persona Christi. The USCCB as well as the CDF give lip service to the pre-eminent issue of life. In light of recent assignments under the current pontificate, I am not hopeful for a postive change.

pax Christi

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