fides' Jack's Mega Anti-Vax Thread

[Peace]

1 hour ago, fides' Jack said:

From the document:

Yeah that's a reasonable interpretation of that sentence you put in bold. The document does not state anything about not doing a protest being a grave sin, however.

I mean, in your answer below you write that telling your nurse that you don't like that the  fact that the virus is tainted would suffice as a sufficient protest. If that's the case then the line between spending an eternity in Heaven with our blessed Lord and an eternity of torture in hell would be whether or not you told a nurse that you didn't like the virus. Would that make sense to you?

But I agree with your conclusion that we have a moral duty to advocate for completely moral vaccines (I would probably say that all Catholics have this duty regardless of whether we take or refuse the vaccine).

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This is a reference to the same conditions that I already quoted above:

Yeah I think you are gonna have to let that LifeSite News article go, at least with me. As I wrote before I am not going to credit the analysis of an anonymous person on the internet. The article states that the requirements are XYZ but that is simply the anonymous author's opinion based on his own personal analysis of the CDF document. If you actually read the CDF document it does not read anything like the 4 point checklist produced by our anonymous internet-man.

If you want to discuss the text of the CDF document itself and what can be deduced from it, that is fair game for me, but I'm not taking an article written by an anonymous "priest" who could be a Wiccan in real life for all I know seriously. It just ain't gonna happen.

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I'm not the authority on what type of protests suffice, so, in my view, as long as you make your opposition known to someone in the system supplying or distributing it (such as the nurse who is giving your shot, in the most micro, to sending a letter to the shot manufacturers, in the macro, then it probably suffices).  In my opinion, it does not suffice simply to oppose it on a public internet forum like this one.  For that detail, it might behoove those of you who have taken the shot to reach out to your pastor or bishop to determine the lengths which are expected.

Nah I think telling your nurse is kind of weak sauce because she really don't have any ability to influence the decision. Something like the letter that @Ash Wednesday linked to is better in my opinion since the companies ultimately control the way the research is done. I'll probably send one of the letters in myself I think.

One of the major problems with it I think is that the vaccines are essentially funded by the government. So if you and I write a letter to Moderna telling them we don't like it, Moderna doesn't really have much of an incentive to listen to us because they are getting paid buy Uncle Sam (I think).

I don't know if there is a "Catholic Health Insurance" but something like that might be pretty interesting. Like, if a huge number of Catholics got together and formed a health insurance company that Catholics around the country could sign up for, then it could have a big influence on the way the research is done I think. If you have an insurance company that will pay for ethical vaccines but will not pay for non-ethically produced vaccines then it hurts these companies bottom line and they are going to listen I think. Just some ideas for that.

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If you watch the Rumble video above, Fr. Ripperger reads the quote in its entirety and explains it.  Fr. Ripperger seems to me to come to the conclusion that if the threat to your health or someone you come in contact with is immediate (as in, if you don't get the shot, you are certain to get it or give it to someone else, AND that there's a high likelihood of long-lasting or irreparable harm) then it's sufficient grave cause.  Fear that you might contract a virus eventually or give it to someone is not sufficient.  Nor is it sufficient given the fact that 99% of people are just fine after a couple weeks with the virus.  

That's my take on the conclusion of this video.

I would say, given this standard, if the rabies vaccine was made with aborted fetal cells, that would be one that would be morally-permissible to take.  But the rabies shot, despite being both safe and effective when used properly (and necessary to save lives), is also completely baby-free (from my limited understanding).

I guess this is reasonable. A lot of it then would fall into the area of prudence, when it comes to assessing the various risk factors and so forth. I think that is up for each Catholic to decide for himself, unless someone who has authority over you (like your bishop) comes along and concludes that in his diocese the circumstances warrant or do not warrant taking the vaccine.

Cheers.

Edited April 29, 2021 by Peace

[fides' Jack]

11 minutes ago, Peace said:

Yeah I think you are gonna have to let that LifeSite News article go, at least with me. As I wrote before I am not going to credit the analysis of an anonymous person on the internet. The article states that the requirements are XYZ but that is simply the anonymous author's opinion based on his own personal analysis of the CDF document. If you actually read the CDF document it does not read anything like the 4 point checklist produced by our anonymous internet-man.

If you want to discuss the text of the CDF document itself and what can be deduced from it, that is fair game for me, but I'm not taking an article written by an anonymous "priest" who could be a Wiccan in real life for all I know seriously. It just ain't gonna happen.

So, I take this to mean, you're no longer going to use ad hominem arguments against this, but you aren't going to argue the specific points at all, yourself, because you don't trust the source, meaning that you've convinced yourself not to listen to reason, based on an ad hominem argument.

Is that the case?

13 minutes ago, Peace said:

Nah I think telling your nurse is kind of weak sauce because she really don't have any ability to influence the decision. Something like the letter that @Ash Wednesday linked to is better in my opinion since the companies ultimately control the way the research is done. I'll probably send one of the letters in myself I think.

Agreed.

14 minutes ago, Peace said:

One of the major problems with it I think is that the vaccines are essentially funded by the government. So if you and I write a letter to Moderna telling them we don't like it, Moderna doesn't really have much of an incentive to listen to us because they are getting paid buy Uncle Sam (I think).

Agreed.

14 minutes ago, Peace said:

I don't know if there is a "Catholic Health Insurance" but something like that might be pretty interesting. Like, if a huge number of Catholics got together and formed a health insurance company that Catholics around the country could sign up for, then it could have a big influence on the way the research is done I think. If you have an insurance company that will pay for ethical vaccines but will not pay for non-ethically produced vaccines then it hurts these companies bottom line and they are going to listen I think. Just some ideas for that.

They have these, and I tried to get involved with one several years ago.  Unfortunately, all insurance companies are so limited by the government that they cease to function the way they were intended to.  Indeed, the system as it is setup right now, is designed to make insurance companies ever expand in terms of both cost and complexity, and contract in terms of performance and availability.  The more the government is involved the more this is true.  The government seriously needs to get out of the insurance world.  The way things are going I believe we'll be completely out of this mess within 15 years. 

17 minutes ago, Peace said:

I guess this is reasonable. A lot of it then would fall into the area of prudence, when it comes to assessing the various risk factors and so forth. I think that is up for each Catholic to decide for himself, unless someone who has authority over you (like your bishop) comes along and concludes that in his diocese the circumstances warrant or do not warrant taking the vaccine.

You're not wrong.  But it's not quite as subjective as you make it out to be.  All of it is subject to "right reason" and truth, including our religious superiors (read: they are also subject to right reason and truth).  If you have evidence that the science does not warrant the application of the moral law as your bishop advocates for, you have a duty to disregard.

 

AANND now we're back at the debate being had a few pages ago... 

29 minutes ago, Peace said:

If that's the case then the line between spending an eternity in Heaven with our blessed Lord and an eternity of torture in hell would be whether or not you told a nurse that you didn't like the virus. Would that make sense to you?

There is often a fine line between mortal sin and venial sin, which is why there are 3 conditions necessary for actually committing mortal sin.  

Fortunately, I don't think it's necessary to do the protesting at the time of or before you get the shot.  I think as long as you do as at some reasonable point, it's probably sufficient.  But, I think as long as you can claim that, yes, you did protest it to the nurse in question, you made at least some kind of effort.  Which could make the difference between spending eternity in heaven or hell.

So, yes.

[Peace]

35 minutes ago, fides' Jack said:

So, I take this to mean, you're no longer going to use ad hominem arguments against this, but you aren't going to argue the specific points at all, yourself, because you don't trust the source, meaning that you've convinced yourself not to listen to reason, based on an ad hominem argument.

Well the issue I think is that the article sets out a certain moral framework for decision making. There is no good reason for me to accept that moral framework as valid considering that it is coming from an anonymous source. You seem to think that I should accept it as a valid framework in the same manner that I should accept the CDF document or dignitas personae as valid frameworks, but there is absolutely no reason why I should do that. The two latter sources are written by Catholic bishops and officially promulgated. The former is a random-thought by an unknown person on the internet. The two classes of documents are not even in the same ballpark.

If you want to prove that the moral framework set forth in the article is valid and that I am bound to operate within that moral framework, please feel free to do that. But the burden is on you to prove it. I don't just have to blindly accept it. And I do not have to prove that it is false. It is not an official Catholic document. It is not a statement by my bishop. It is the opinion of a random person on the internet who may be a priest or a Wiccan. If you think that I must accept it, then the burden is on you to prove why I must accept it.

But in order to satisfy that burden, you will need to refer back to the CDF document (and/or other official documents) in order to prove that the framework is valid, consistent with, and fully supported by those documents.

From my standpoint, if we are going to do all of that analysis to determine whether the framework in the anonymous internet-article is valid, we may as well just use the time and refer to the CDF document and other official Catholic documents themselves in the first instance to address the topic that we are discussing. Why should I base my analysis on an random article on the internet when we have authoritative Catholic documents that we can use to discuss the issue? I don't think you have a good answer to this question.

The problem here is that you seem to want to frame the issue in terms of the standard set forth in the LifeSite News article. I reject your attempt to do so. The standards that I follow are in Official Catholic documents. I do not know why this is a surprise to you. It has generally always been my stance on this site to go to the authoritative sources for analysis.

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They have these, and I tried to get involved with one several years ago.  Unfortunately, all insurance companies are so limited by the government that they cease to function the way they were intended to.  Indeed, the system as it is setup right now, is designed to make insurance companies ever expand in terms of both cost and complexity, and contract in terms of performance and availability.  The more the government is involved the more this is true.  The government seriously needs to get out of the insurance world.  The way things are going I believe we'll be completely out of this mess within 15 years. 

Well I think there should be some hope here in the future, with legislation, the Supreme Court changing, etc. Here I suppose I am favor of just having a lot of different options. I am not against private insurance, I am not against government insurance (like Medicare). I think both have their time and place but the key is to have a lot of different options available so that individual people can choose what is best for them.

At a high level (and I have expressed it on the site before) my opinion is that the abortion issue is essentially dead-in-the water in the USA until we change the culture, and that changing the culture should be the top priority. If you have a situation where about 50% or more of Americans have a personal belief that abortion is acceptable, then it is never going to matter what courts you have, what legislation you have, what health care systems you have, etc. because these always will reflect the will of the majority. The very idea that we are going to make a significant dent in abortion by way of legislation or the courts is about as laughable and unrealistic idea to me as the so-called war on drugs. If the demand is great people are going to have it. The fundamental issue is that our culture is screwed, and we need to change the culture so that most people strongly recognize the value of life. Until that culture shift happens we'll never see any progress on the abortion issue in my opinion, so I think a lot of our activities are misplaced.

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You're not wrong.  But it's not quite as subjective as you make it out to be.  All of it is subject to "right reason" and truth, including our religious superiors (read: they are also subject to right reason and truth).  If you have evidence that the science does not warrant the application of the moral law as your bishop advocates for, you have a duty to disregard.

AANND now we're back at the debate being had a few pages ago... 

Heh. I dunno if your "evidence" would warrant disregarding your bishop. I suppose this could be a new thread - but generally my position has been that the authority of a bishop extends also to weighing prudential factors, if the bishop so-decides. I don't think the bishop is limited to merely setting forth moral principles that each Catholic has to determine how they apply in his own life. I think a bishop has authority to state "I have analyzed the science, the risk factors, and the moral principles, and I have concluded XYZ with respect to the vaccine." Bishops generally don't do that, but I think should be within their authority. Fundamentally I suppose I view the authority of the bishop as extending to both moral principles and the application of those moral principles to particular circumstances. But I would imagine that some folks disagree with me here.

Edited April 29, 2021 by Peace

[hakutaku]

5 hours ago, fides' Jack said:

Fortunately, I don't think it's necessary to do the protesting at the time of or before you get the shot.  I think as long as you do as at some reasonable point, it's probably sufficient.  But, I think as long as you can claim that, yes, you did protest it to the nurse in question, you made at least some kind of effort.

Like the women who leave the abortion protest line to get an abortion do!

[ReasonableFaith]

34 minutes ago, hakutaku said:

Like the women who leave the abortion protest line to get an abortion do!

This also brings to mind those women  availing themselves of such medical services at the very same or similar clinics to remove a lifeless baby, fetus, or unknown clump of cells from their body.  
 

Is there a special form of repentance for those harassing women attempting to do so?

[Ash Wednesday]

Just a thought on point 4:

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One must oppose the fact that the therapeutic intervention is abortion-tainted.

I believe this part of the criteria might be in order to steer the faithful away from the error of consequentialism/proportionalism -- which is a condemned error that frames an evil as being actively intended and justifiable, as opposed to an unintended consequence.

So it's not exclusively a matter of writing a letter or doing something to express your disapproval to check off a list (though there is a moral duty as I mentioned in Dignitas Personae) but rather one cannot receive the vaccine as a proportionalist, viewing the abortion tainting in itself as being morally justifiable. If they did, then they would not be receiving the vaccine in a frame of mind that is morally licit.

This is my understanding of it. Perhaps someone else might be able to confirm whether or not this is the case, so consider this a question more than anything else. 

(I think, though perhaps not the same, it might at least partially reconcile a similar frame of mind of the repentant disposition that the Orthodox hold despite "allowing" sin -- and what Catholics would word as "cooperation with evil" which has a specific distinction in moral theology that does not exist with the Orthodox.  The difference or gap here being that the Orthodox don't have categories for sin (venial, mortal) or the same kind of Thomistic analysis that Catholics do.)

[Peace]

6 hours ago, hakutaku said:

Like the women who leave the abortion protest line to get an abortion do!

It's not very difficult to find a hypocrite in the world. I suspect that if we examiner your life (and mine) we can find hypocritical behavior as well.

[Peace]

2 hours ago, Ash Wednesday said:

(I think, though perhaps not the same, it might at least partially reconcile a similar frame of mind of the repentant disposition that the Orthodox hold despite "allowing" sin -- and what Catholics would word as "cooperation with evil" which has a specific distinction in moral theology that does not exist with the Orthodox.  The difference or gap here being that the Orthodox don't have categories for sin (venial, mortal) or the same kind of Thomistic analysis that Catholics do.)

This explanation helps me understand @Anastasia a bit better I think. Perhaps to a certain extent some of the basic dispositions toward the action are similar but we express them differently through our own theological frameworks. I suspect that she concludes that what we are doing is simply ignoring or masking sin, because she is analyzing us through her own framework, without having a deep understanding of ours. If her theology does not make the various distinctions that we do I can see how she can view it that way. To me it seems that they permit sin before it even occurs, which seems entirely contrary to the gospel and offends my basic moral sense, but perhaps that is because I am looking at it through the Catholic lens and don't have a deep understanding of the EO viewpoint.

18 hours ago, fides' Jack said:

I know of no "theories of atonement".  I have no idea what a "theory of atonement" is. 

Well you can start here. Also discussed in the Catechism.

https://www.catholic.com/encyclopedia/doctrine-of-the-atonement

[fides' Jack]

20 hours ago, Peace said:

Well the issue I think is that the article sets out a certain moral framework for decision making. There is no good reason for me to accept that moral framework as valid considering that it is coming from an anonymous source. You seem to think that I should accept it as a valid framework in the same manner that I should accept the CDF document or dignitas personae as valid frameworks, but there is absolutely no reason why I should do that. The two latter sources are written by Catholic bishops and officially promulgated. The former is a random-thought by an unknown person on the internet. The two classes of documents are not even in the same ballpark.

If you've read the document, then you will see that this priest (I assume the best), is just reiterating what's in the document. 

My point is that whether or not he's a priest, it doesn't matter.  It's not his authority as a priest that matters, but the point that he's making.  I would've linked the article even if it said, "Random lay person makes great point about Catholic morality and the covid vaccines".

But since you refuse to believe that, I'll lay it out for you:

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In this sense, 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.

First bullet by unknown priest:

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There is no available morally untainted therapeutic intervention that neutralizes the proposed health threat.

I'm sensing that you're going to argue that the document is saying "vaccine" whereas the priest is saying, "therapeutic intervention".  Right reason would dictate that if you can take a tylenol or jolly rancher and get the same effect, but the only vaccines that are available are morally tainted, you may not morally receive the vaccine.

Next:

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The moral duty to avoid such passive material cooperation is not obligatory if there is a grave danger, such as the otherwise uncontainable spread of a serious pathological agent

Second bullet by unknown priest:

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There must exist a proportionate cause for using an abortion tainted therapeutic intervention based on the risks involved.

Third bullet:

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There must exist an actual grave threat to your health or that of others if you were to refrain from taking the proposed abortion-tainted therapeutic intervention.

To me both of these bullets are really saying the same thing, which the document above covered.  Maybe you disagree.  We could discuss.

All of these things are in agreement with Catholic moral teaching, as well as what Fr. Ripperger brought up in the video I linked before.  

We already covered the fourth bullet, which is also discussed in the document, as well as Dignitas Personae, and discussed what might be a reasonable protest.

9 hours ago, Peace said:

Well you can start here. Also discussed in the Catechism.

https://www.catholic.com/encyclopedia/doctrine-of-the-atonement

Looked for it in the Catechism.  I don't see it discussed there.  Maybe you could point it out.  I see the doctrine of atonement in the Catechism, but nothing about theories.  I also see the link you posted is about the doctrine of atonement.  Reading further down it does talk at least a little about a few different "theories".  In the sense that it's discussing them, I admit I did know there were ongoing discussions.  I just never heard them referred to as "theories of atonement".  Maybe that's my own intellectual ignorance (of which I'm sure there's a lot).

4 minutes ago, fides' Jack said:

tylenol or jolly rancher

M&Ms are good, too.  Probably better for you than these experimental shots.

9 hours ago, Peace said:

This explanation helps me understand @Anastasia a bit better I think. Perhaps to a certain extent some of the basic dispositions toward the action are similar but we express them differently through our own theological frameworks. I suspect that she concludes that what we are doing is simply ignoring or masking sin, because she is analyzing us through her own framework, without having a deep understanding of ours. If her theology does not make the various distinctions that we do I can see how she can view it that way. To me it seems that they permit sin before it even occurs, which seems entirely contrary to the gospel and offends my basic moral sense, but perhaps that is because I am looking at it through the Catholic lens and don't have a deep understanding of the EO viewpoint.

I was recently told about how Eastern Catholics view Eucharistic adoration.  In the West, we love adoration because we love being so close to God, but in the East, they view the Eucharist more strictly as Something to be eaten, and so adoration to them, at least from the point of view of the person I was talking to, is a bit like taunting and teasing by dangling food in front of you.  I don't know, I could be misrepresenting based on my own interpretation of what this person said.

[fides' Jack]

12 hours ago, Ash Wednesday said:

So it's not exclusively a matter of writing a letter or doing something to express your disapproval to check off a list (though there is a moral duty as I mentioned in Dignitas Personae) but rather one cannot receive the vaccine as a proportionalist, viewing the abortion tainting in itself as being morally justifiable. If they did, then they would not be receiving the vaccine in a frame of mind that is morally licit.

I think this is an important distinction, and helps to frame the issue in the proper light.

[Peace]

2 hours ago, fides' Jack said:

If you've read the document, then you will see that this priest (I assume the best), is just reiterating what's in the document. 

No, the anonymous internet-person does not just reiterate what is in the document. If that were true, then you would just recite the document itself. You want to recite the internet article because it is more favorable to your position than the language recited in the actual CDF document, obviously.

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My point is that whether or not he's a priest, it doesn't matter.  It's not his authority as a priest that matters, but the point that he's making.  I would've linked the article even if it said, "Random lay person makes great point about Catholic morality and the covid vaccines".

That's fine, but as I wrote, you have the burden to establish that his framework is consistent with official Catholic documents.

Quote

But since you refuse to believe that, I'll lay it out for you:

First bullet by unknown priest:

I'm sensing that you're going to argue that the document is saying "vaccine" whereas the priest is saying, "therapeutic intervention".  Right reason would dictate that if you can take a tylenol or jolly rancher and get the same effect, but the only vaccines that are available are morally tainted, you may not morally receive the vaccine.

You are wrong. What the CDF document states and what the anonymous internet-person wrote are not equivalent. If I write "When it rains, you may  carry an umbrella." From this statement "You may only carry and umbrella when it rains" does not logically conclude. This is exactly the type of faulty logic that you are attempting to employ here, and I reject it.

And it is also rejected, as you note yourself, because "therapeutic intervention" does not equivocate to "vaccine." The anonymous-internet person is attempting to make his rule broader by using different language. I reject it.

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Third bullet:

To me both of these bullets are really saying the same thing, which the document above covered.  Maybe you disagree.  We could discuss.

All of these things are in agreement with Catholic moral teaching, as well as what Fr. Ripperger brought up in the video I linked before.  

No. I also reject it. The CDF document does not state that point.

Now if you want to stop wasting time by attempting me to accept the framework of an anonymous person on the internet, which you should know by now that will never happen, you may feel free to make whatever arguments you want in favor of your position using the CDF document and any other officially promulgated Catholic documents as you please.

Again - the reason why you want to use the anonymous-internet article instead of official Catholic documents is because the anonymous-internet article is more favorable to your position than the documents that the Church has officially promulgated. I am never going to buy such obvious attempts by you to claim the "high-ground" in the battle or to gain the "home-court" advantage.

We can use the officially promulgated Church documents that we both agree are authoritative, or we can both be on our merry way.

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Looked for it in the Catechism.  I don't see it discussed there.  Maybe you could point it out.  I see the doctrine of atonement in the Catechism, but nothing about theories. 

What you need to see the word "theory"? Please don't tell me you are being that ridiculous. For the sake of charity I will assume that you are not. You can see the ransom theory and the satisfaction theory mentioned at CCC 595 et seq.

Quote

I also see the link you posted is about the doctrine of atonement.  Reading further down it does talk at least a little about a few different "theories".  In the sense that it's discussing them, I admit I did know there were ongoing discussions.  I just never heard them referred to as "theories of atonement".  Maybe that's my own intellectual ignorance (of which I'm sure there's a lot).

The entire article from the Catholic Encyclopedia is about the various theories of atonement.

Quote

I was recently told about how Eastern Catholics view Eucharistic adoration.  In the West, we love adoration because we love being so close to God, but in the East, they view the Eucharist more strictly as Something to be eaten, and so adoration to them, at least from the point of view of the person I was talking to, is a bit like taunting and teasing by dangling food in front of you.  I don't know, I could be misrepresenting based on my own interpretation of what this person said.

It could be. From what I hear even the current practice of adoration in the West is a bit of a modern phenomenon, but I would need to research it more. This isn't a topic on which I am well-versed from a historical/theological standpoint.

Edited April 30, 2021 by Peace

[Ash Wednesday]

3 hours ago, fides' Jack said:

I think this is an important distinction, and helps to frame the issue in the proper light.

Indeed. What I'm interpreting from what Anastasia has been trying to say -- is that the ends never justify the means. And this is correct, because "the ends justifies the means" or that proportionate reason renders something "justifiable" is the condemned error of proportionalism and consequentialism in a nutshell.  Intent absolutely matters.

And I think it's easy for intent to be questioned or misunderstood, because the messaging out there from prominent clergy, at least what we are hearing, does not include much of any emphasis on pushing for ethical vaccines. I've seen a lot of emphasis on pushing for poor countries to get access to vaccines, but very little remarks about pushing for them to be ethical in comparison.

[Peace]

@Ash Wednesday @fides' Jack

From a theological standpoint how do you even establish that the Moderna vaccine rises to the level of remote material cooperation with evil?

I just went online and looked at the vaccine itself.

Here is some info:

https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/46701/what-connection-does-modernas-vaccine-have-to-aborted-fetal-tissue 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XlPObu7upgo

If I go down to my local pharmacy and take a Moderna shot, the specific vaccine that I receive does not contain any aborted fetal-cells. Nor was the vaccine that I received grown out of or using any aborted fetal-cell.

Apparently this is what happened:

1) In the early stages of designing the vaccine, Moderna wanted to confirm that the "Spike protein" that would comprise the vaccine would replicate in human cells.

2) In order to confirm that it would replicate, an example vaccine was tested on a line of aborted-fetal cells, and it was confirmed that the spike protein would replicate.

3) When it came to producing the "spike-protein" in mass quantities for public distribution, the vaccine was produced without using any aborted fetal cells at all. That is, the vaccine does not appear to have been grown out of any aborted fetal cell lines at all.

For example, lets say that a Copycat company comes along and simply copies Moderna's vaccine and produces it on its own, the copycat company never having done any research, development, or testing on aborted fetal-cells whatsoever.

1) Does taking Moderna's production-vaccine rise to the level of "remote material cooperation" given that the production-vaccines have no physical connection to any aborted fetal cell lines?

2) Does taking the Copycat company's vaccine rise to the level of "remote material cooperation."

It think its gonna be very difficult to even prove (1) and (2) above in the first place based on those facts.

I think it is going to be very hard to demonstrate "remote material cooperation" here, unless you essentially prohibit the use of knowledge itself, that was obtained through unethical means. This would be a very-slippery slope. We'd probably need to go back to living with stone-age technology if we prohibit the use of knowledge itself that was obtained unethically.

Actually if we look further at it, the connection between Moderna's vaccine and the aborted stem-cell lines appears even more tenuous than what I wrote above:

https://www.thepublicdiscourse.com/2020/11/72866/

Pfizer and Moderna’s Cooperation in Evil

In the cases of both Pfizer and Moderna, we are dealing with cases of at least triply remote cooperation in evil with HEK293 cells, which are not morally relevant when considering receiving such a vaccine. Early in the research on COVID-19, some scientists made a purified version of the protein and protein-coding genes using HEK293 cells. This information seems to have been used by both companies in working out which part of the RNA code they would use in their vaccine. But this is simply existing information; neither company is morally responsible for creating it. Moderna also did some research on HEK293 cells before COVID-19 existed. As far as I can tell, this is either completely irrelevant to its COVID vaccine or only provides prior information like the previous example. Pfizer did one of its many tests on HEK293 cells. Moderna used the same cells for a test. These tests do not seem morally relevant for choosing whether or not to vaccinate. When you vaccinate, you cooperate remotely in the production of the vaccine, which cooperated remotely in the tests that appropriated and likely cooperated remotely in the evil of abortion, so this is at least triply remote cooperation by the time we are getting vaccinated.

[Peace]

https://www.patheos.com/blogs/throughcatholiclenses/2020/12/12-things-less-remote-cooperation-in-evil-than-covid-vaccines/?utm_source=St.+Patrick+Catholic+Parish&utm_campaign=d82ede6746-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2019_10_30_07_40_COPY_01&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_07f9a320f7-d82ede6746-406510325

Seriously. Look at this list of companies that gives money to Planned Parenthood:

https://familycouncil.org/?page_id=14547

Verizon and Comcast on there. Look, if we have to refuse the vaccine because Moderna used general knowledge in the production of its vaccines, you sure as heck can't have Verizon and Comcast provide your internet when they are giving money to Planned Parenthood. So its like go find another internet provider and then get back to me. That toilet-paper in your bathroom. Go throw it out and buy some from another company, because the company you buy TP from is funding abortion.

It all goes back to the question I raised earlier - where do you draw the line? I'd be plenty willing to be that folks who want to sit there and say that others have crossed the line by taking the Moderna vaccine, won't be switching their internet service providers or the brand of TP anytime soon, even though the connection between those companies and abortion is greater than the vaccine.

[Peace]

@fides' Jack Do you want to take a flight on your next vacation? Well, it had better be an Airbus because Boeing gives money to planned parenthood.

What kind of freezer do you have in your kitchen? Better hope it's not GE cause you are gonna have to throw it out since GE gives money to planned parenthood.

How about your PC? Running MS windows? Well, you had better start running Linux instead cause Microsoft gives money to planned parenthood. What are your grave reasons for running windows instead of Linux?

What kind of car are you driving? If it's American you are gonna have to sell that and get yourself a Toyota instead.

What bank do you use? Chances are you are gonna have to change that too bro. Cause all of those companies directly funding abortion, which is more remote than the vaccines that you want to prohibit the rest of the world from taking.

https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/46701/what-connection-does-modernas-vaccine-have-to-aborted-fetal-tissue 
 

Quote

 

Lanciotti emphasized that the HEK-293T cells in question were not used to evaluate the vaccine itself, since the vaccine had not yet been designed, but rather went into the background knowledge that enabled the vaccine’s design.

He also explained that the spike protein itself is not contaminated with fetal cells, as the spike protein produced by the vaccine comes directly from the synthetic RNA injected, and is “100% newly derived and pure.”

 

Now how do you get remote material cooperation from the use of general background knowledge?

If that is remote material cooperation then literally everything in the world except going to Mass is remote material cooperation.

At least insofar as the Moderna vaccine is concerned, I just don't see any moral case against receiving it whatsoever.

And if you disagree with me, like I wrote above, its time to sell your windows PC on which you are writing this post, and buy yourself a MacBook pro.