‘Roll up your sleeve’

Today, we continue our new series on the importance of receiving the COVID-19 vaccine. Over the next several weeks, you’ll hear from your neighbors, faith leaders and those in the business community, among others. They’ll share their personal stories — all of them with a simple and heartfelt message: Get vaccinated. Save lives.

Pope Francis recently launched a powerful appeal for people to get vaccinated, calling it “an act of love.”

In a video message, the pope praised the work of researchers and scientists in producing a safe and effective COVID-19 vaccine. “Thanks to God’s grace and to the work of many,” he said, “we now have vaccine to protect us from COVID-19.”

I’m not Roman Catholic, but as a retired clergy and chaplain of a Protestant faith group in civilian, military a nd health care settings, I applaud the pope for his courage and insi g ht to encourage us to get the vaccine to protect ourselves and the others around us as an expression of love.

I agree also with Dr. Francis Collins, director of the National Institutes of Health and an evangelical Christian, who said the vaccine is a gift from God and an answer to our prayers. In the words of Collins, “Roll up your sleeve” and “unwrap that gift.”

The Rev. Paul L. Yeun is a retired United Methodist minister who served 10 years in churches in Ohio, 20 years in the U.S. Air Force chaplaincy and 18 years as director of pastoral services at Chambersburg Hospital in Pennsylvania. He and his wife now live in Atlanta.

The Rev. Paul L. Yeun