U.S. Supreme Court rejects Catholic woman’s request for religious vaccine exemption for child’s school attendance

The U.S. Supreme Court on Sept. 8 declined to hear a case from a New York Catholic woman who sought to send her son to kindergarten without receiving the vaccines required by state law for public school attendance. The court’s decision, made on its emergency docket, did not include an explanation, as is common with such rulings.

All states require children to be vaccinated against certain diseases to attend public schools, though policies for religious or medical exemptions vary. Four states—California, Connecticut, Maine, and New York—only allow medical exemptions, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation.

Jane Doe, identified in court filings as a lifelong practicing Roman Catholic, argued that her religious beliefs prevent her from undergoing vaccination or allowing her son to be vaccinated. She wrote that defiling the blood by mixing it with the blood of animals, with the remains of aborted human beings, or with foreign biological material violates God’s Word. She claimed vaccination injects biological material derived from unclean sources directly into the bloodstream, which her faith forbids.

However, vaccines do not contain fetal cells. Some vaccines involve growing viruses in cell lines believed to be derived originally from unborn children aborted in the mid-20th century, such as the HEK-293 fetal cell line. Common medications, including over-the-counter pain relievers and antacids, have also been tested against this cell line. These cell lines are still ongoing, but filtration processes prevent any material from those lines from entering the vaccine itself.

The Catholic Church has consistently stated that Catholics may undergo vaccination despite remote degrees of connection to such cell lines where alternatives are not available. During the COVID-19 pandemic, U.S. Catholic bishops generally encouraged Catholics, where possible, to seek vaccines with fewer connections to these cell lines.

Doe’s attorneys also stated she faced “imminent forced relocation” to Florida without an exception. In August, the Catholic bishops of Florida issued a strong defense of their ability to determine policies for Catholic schools after Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier sent them a letter demanding that Catholic schools adopt religious exemptions to vaccine requirements or risk their participation in the state’s school voucher program.

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