COVID vaccine mandates test the limits of religious exemptions

In extending a temporary restraining order on mandating COVID-19 vaccines for New York health care workers who raised religious exemptions, a judge made clear the court did not determine that health care workers qualify for a religious exemption. Rather, the court found, the workers have a federally protected right to seek such an exemption.

Alas, we are early in the journey of vaccine-mandate litigation. But as the courts splinter over various vaccine mandate issues, religious exemptions may be more than a legal development. Their dynamics are part of a broader, albeit complex, pandemic-era religious awakening.

Isolation can inspire a sense of spirituality, which is the very reason many highly religious people seek hermitages. Naturally then, an extended quarantine, especially one with the risk of death looming, could foster spirituality. However, surges in suicide, mental health crises and obesity during the pandemic suggest the spiritual effect was largely negative.

In fact, 2020 Gallup data show that U.S. membership in houses of worship fell below the majority for the first time. This trend will likely continue as 66% of U. S. adults born before 1946 belong to a church, compared with 36% of millennials.

Nonetheless, COVID did manage to spur passionate religious-related discussion. As an example, can communion be a vector for disease or is it incorruptible?

Can large gatherings in mosques, churches or temples cause community spread, or is it safe, holy ground?

Religious exemption ambiguity is understandable, given that religious faiths themselves vary widely and ascertaining a sincerely held belief is tricky business.

While some faiths are against medical intervention altogether, major faiths are not.

This particular religious awakening is unusual in that it is confronted by individuals, rather than religious institutions themselves. This is a battle that individuals are fighting alone or with their unions.

This is a large undertaking for a society that is far from being high on theology, but is rather one of defection from houses of worship.

As religious individuals goit-alone, the religious exemption debate will refocus attention on the realm of deeply held, transcendent beliefs beyond our everyday routines. Religious leadership may have inadvertently democratized theology.

Regardless of one’s vaccine views, the COVID vaccine mandate battle will set a larger precedent for religion in America — legal and beyond.