In the two and a half years since the first COVID vaccines were administered, anti-vaccination sentiment has grown exponentially. Scepticism about vaccines has been voiced, in particular, in religious communities across the world, from South Korea and New Zealand to South Africa, the UK and prominently among white evangelicals, in the US.
In my own church, people have expressed disbelief and denial. Some have claimed the pandemic is a lie and that the solutions proffered are proof of governmental population control and the formation of a “new world order”.
This clearly isn’t the case for all religious people. But research confirms there is a strong correlation between spirituality and COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy, scepticism, and outright rejection. Among some religious and spiritual groups, the scepticism about vaccination is rooted in low faith in science. Among others, it overlaps with wider conspiracy theories.
