I’ve been seeing an email recently that seems to be getting more and more common as a response to employees requesting religious exemption for the covid vaccines. Some of y’all have wanted to know what my response would be to the questions asked so I thought I would write it out and make it available to anyone who runs into this problem.

This would be my response:

“My understanding of the way fetal cell lines are used in the development of Covid 19 vaccines is that the Astrazeneca and J&J both use viruses that were grown on a fetal cell line and according to my research, it’s very difficult to purify the final product enough to remove all residual DNA. The FDA allows for up to 10 ng per dose in biologics (vaccines are classified as biologics) for this reason and I see no proof that these products have suddenly achieved a purification process that has been impossible up until now.

As for the mRNA vaccines, both openly admit to testing the spike protein on fetal cell lines in development and since that is an important step in development, I feel these vaccines are dependent on these fetal cell lines and I do not want to participate in receiving products that are so dependent on a process I consider sinful and wrong in the extreme.

All of the drugs you list (except for the MMR v, which I also decline to use for the reason I list above) are tested on fetal cell lines a long time after the drug is on the market (some of these are tested decades after they’re developed) and the testing has nothing to do with the manufacturing process and is completely separate from the manufacturer and has no influence on how the drug is made. If you can show me studies on any of these drugs being tested on fetal cell lines in development or show that the testing has changed their components or design in any way, I will gladly remove any and all of them from my life. I am dedicated in my desire to distance myself from this practice and any drug that is dependent on these fetal cell lines will not be a part of my life or health practices.

There is a distinction between being tested in development and being tested decades after being on the market. The main difference is that these drugs are not dependent on fetal cell lines for their existence. You using them as such is actually misleading and does not stand up to an honest, logical view. This is a false equivalency and is thus irrelevant to this discussion. Unless this is done in ignorance, it’s manipulative and goes against our freedom of religion as a nation. Even if these drugs were tested in development, you are not my religious authority and as such have no right to hold me to what you mistakenly consider to be consistent. Your duty is to approve my declination to a product that I consider morally wrong as I feel is an expression of my religion.

Thank you for standing by that duty as you cease to use manipulative tactics to coerce me.

Respectfully yours, etc”

Feel free to use any or all of that if you find yourself in this fight.

If you want evidence for any of these statements, feel free to check out my recently edited blog post on the topic, or listen to this podcast for more information.

My favorite religious exemption templates can be found here or here.