Vials of Johnson & Johnson's Janssen COVID-19 vaccine are seen during the phase 3 ensemble period in this undated photo. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved use of the company's one-shot vaccine Feb. 27, 2021. (CNS photo/Johnson & Johnson, Handout via Reuters)
By: Catholic News Service
Date: March 4, 2021
WASHINGTON (CNS) — In a new video, the chairman of the U.S. bishops’ Committee on Doctrine reiterated that use of the Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine “can be used in good moral conscience.”
“There’s no moral need to turn down a vaccine, including the Johnson & Johnson vaccine, which is morally acceptable to use,” Bishop Kevin C. Rhoades of Fort Wayne-South Bend, Indiana, said in a two-minute video posted on YouTube March 4.
The bishop cited an earlier Vatican statement that “has made clear that all the COVID vaccines recognized as clinically safe and effective can be used in good conscience.”
He also repeated comments that he made in a March 2 statement in conjunction with Archbishop Joseph F. Naumann of Kansas City, Kansas, chairman of the USCCB’s Committee on Pro-Life Activities, that if a choice of vaccines is available “we recommend that you pick one with the least connection to abortion-derived cell lines.”
“Pfizer and Moderna’s connection is more remote than that of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine,” he said.
“What’s most important is that people get vaccinated,” Bishop Rhoades continued. “It can be an act of charity that serves the common good. At the same time, as we bishops have already done, it’s really important for us to encourage development of vaccines that do not use abortion-derived cell lines. This is very important for the future.”
The Johnson & Johnson Jansen one-shot COVID-19 is the third vaccine that has received approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.
In their original statement, the prelates concluded, that “while we should continue to insist that pharmaceutical companies stop using abortion-derived cell lines, given the world-wide suffering that this pandemic is causing, we affirm again that being vaccinated can be an act of charity that serves the common good.”
In December, the prelates addressed concerns over what then were the newly approved BioNTech and Moderna vaccines because “an abortion-derived cell line was used for testing them,” but “not used in their production.” They noted then that cell lines used were derived from fetuses aborted in the 1970s.
However, they said March 2, the Johnson & Johnson vaccine raises “additional moral concerns” because it was “developed, tested and is produced with abortion-derived cell lines.”
In their more recent statement, the bishops also quoted the Vatican’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, which judged that “when ethically irreproachable COVID-19 vaccines are not available … it is morally acceptable to receive COVID-19 vaccines that have used cell lines from aborted fetuses in their research and production process.”
They added that “if one can choose among equally safe and effective COVID-19 vaccines, the vaccine with the least connection to abortion-derived cell lines should be chosen. Therefore, if one has the ability to choose a vaccine, Pfizer or Moderna’s vaccines should be chosen over Johnson & Johnson’s.”