A pastor's take: Why religion won't fix vaccine hesitancy in Tennessee | Opinion

• Rev. Dr. Susan Thistlethwaite is an ordained pastor in the United Church of Christ and president and professor emerita of Chicago Theological Seminary.

There is a tragedy unfolding in the state of Tennessee. Anti-vaxxer attitudes are taking hold and putting the lives of innocent people at risk.

This has to be stopped.

As is now well-known, the Tennessee state government has fired its top vaccination official, Dr. Michelle Fiscus on July 12 for clarifying that teens could choose to get vaccinated, an action that is totally legal in Tennessee under the Mature Minor doctrine.

Dr. Fiscus has pushed back in a hard-hitting letter that says state leaders have “bought into the anti-vaccine misinformation campaign.”

Not only that, but Tennessee officials have now literally jumped off a vaccination cliff. Dr. Fiscus sounded the alarm that they are “halting all vaccination outreach for children. Not just COVID-19 vaccine outreach for teens, but all communications around vaccines of any kind. No back-to-school messaging to the more than 30,000 parents who did not get their children measles vaccines last year due to the pandemic.” 

The state only recently reversed course.

Why is an entirely preventable tragedy unfolding?

One reason could be that just over 50% of adults in Tennessee identify as evangelical Protestant and white evangelical protestants are overwhelmingly the population most resistant to getting the COVID vaccine.

I dearly wish, as a pastor and seminary professor, that for such Christians a religious message to get vaccinated would work. “Love your neighbor as yourself” (Mark 12:30-31) should do it, and, after all, Jesus of Nazareth routinely “healed the sick.” (Matt. 14:14).

But that has not been enough to change the minds of these Christians about the vaccine.

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Why?

I believe the continued vaccine hesitancy among especially evangelical Protestants is because the source of the fear and rejection of vaccines is not primarily religious.

It is a web of conspiracy-mongering designed to garner political momentum against the Biden administration’s push to get to “herd immunity” among the U.S. population, and to be able to claim “failure” on the administration’s part in general.

Businesses and institutions must step up to avoid more suffering

Alex Berenson, all around political and cultural gadfly who has been wrong about virtually everything regarding the COVID-19 pandemic, used the slow-down in vaccinations as an applause line recently at CPAC, the Conservative Political Action Conference.

“Hurray for suffering and death!” is about as anti-religious a message as one could find. In fact, it is not religious, it is driven by total misinformation and deliberate fearmongering designed to drive a right-wing political agenda and this has captured many conservative Christians.

So what should Tennessee do, what should the whole country do, to prevent a tragic return to the months of economic shutdown, overflowing ICU’s, mass death and widespread, needless suffering?

As a pastor, it pains me to say that I think it will be up to businesses and institutions to require vaccinations for workers and students.

This does not mean I think that segment of the society is exactly immune from political and social pressure, but these parts of our society are driven almost wholly by economic motives.

Economic self-interest can perhaps override conspiracies and political jockeying where religious and ethical considerations have been less successful.

The businesses and institutions of Tennessee must take leadership here.

God help us. We cannot risk a return to the mass death, suffering and economic shutdowns of 2020.

Rev. Dr. Susan Thistlethwaite is an ordained pastor in the United Church of Christ and president and professor emerita of Chicago Theological Seminary.